


Hoarding

by Nemainofthewater



Series: dragon!Jaskier [6]
Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Angst, Blood, Domesticity, Don't copy to another site, F/F, Family, Fluff, Found Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Child Abuse, M/M, Murder, Mystery, Nightmares, Panic Attacks, Pre-Slash, Sequel, dragon!Jaskier, one that's 40 years old though, potentially upsetting imagery, shining!verse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-12
Updated: 2020-06-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:47:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 21
Words: 29,486
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23620006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nemainofthewater/pseuds/Nemainofthewater
Summary: It's winter. Time for warmth, and family, and closeness. Jaskier's hoard spend the winter months learning what it is to be a family. Meanwhile, Yennefer and Véa are investigating a murder four decades old in the coastal city of Lettenhove...Sequel to Shining.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion, Jaskier & Borch, Jaskier & Saesenthessis, Jaskier & his hoard, Véa (The Witcher)/Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg
Series: dragon!Jaskier [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1623493
Comments: 1167
Kudos: 1181





	1. Yennefer

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! and welcome to the multi-chapter sequel to Shining. This should be alternating Yennefer and Jaskier's POVs, though who knows really what I'm going to do. Certainly not me...

The portal opens before her, wide and steady and Yennefer urges Sunshine forward. He obeys eagerly, prancing forward with his head held high and legs straight, tossing his head to show his mane- decorated with dozens of tiny plaits and small flowers- to its best advantage. As they move through the portal, Yennefer can hear Roach’s unimpressed snort from behind them.

It takes less than a heartbeat, and then they are through the portal and Yennefer is left squinting in the weak winter sun. There is the sound of waves behind her and she can feel her hair dampen and frizz in the sea mist. She takes a deep breath, steeling herself. Trying not the think of a beach, and a baby, and a shallow grave.

Behind her, she can hear the faint creak of leather, an annoyed whinny, the chime of the bells that Ciri had plaited into Roach’s mane. She lets the portal close. Yennefer does not turn around, but she does allow herself the luxury of a small smile. This is one difference that she can hold onto; that this time she is not alone.

“Welcome to Lettenhove,” she says. “Possibly one of the shittiest cities on the Redanian coast.” Not an exaggeration or an understatement. Though not four decades ago, the city had once been a centre of commerce, famed throughout the Continent, it had long since fallen to wreck and ruin, its walls dull and defeated by the harsh sea winds. It was mystery that still puzzled the learned scholars and economists of Oxenfurt: how such a city, ideally located at the mouth of the great Bruina river which flows throughout the kingdoms of Kaedwen and Redania and empties itself into the Gulf of Praxeda, further opening up trade opportunities with Kovir and Previss- how a such a city could _not_ prosper. Taxes, perhaps. But there are taxes everywhere. The unseasonable storms are cited as another reason, and indeed they do buffer and beat the city all year long, irrespective of how clear the seas are even a few miles out. Yennefer suspects that it’s a combination of factors- the weather and the taxes and the fucking misery that she, who is gazing upon it for the first time, can feel pouring out from behind its walls, as ubiquitous as the mist.

Véa pulls up beside her, absently soothing Roach who, it must be said, emphatically does not like portals. She understands the need; Yennefer can see the intelligence in her eyes, has seen first-hand the speed that she rushes through them whenever there is a true emergency. Otherwise, she is as obstinate as her Witcher, and no amount of coaxing, apples, or sugar cubes will convince her otherwise. Not that Yennefer took part in any of those attempts; no, she let Ciri do the bribery. And then Geralt. And then Jaskier’s wide eyes. Roach had refused each of them in turn.

Yennefer doesn’t know whether stubbornness is something that Geralt actively looks for in his horses, or whether it’s a side-effect of travelling with the world’s stubbornest Witcher. But either way, Roach is one of the most stubborn horses she has ever met. Which is hilarious when it’s Geralt, or his bard, that she’s inconveniencing, but less amusing when she’s the one being inconvenienced. She could _force_ the mare through the portal, but that was not sustainable in the long term. Not if they were to be travelling back and forth each day for the foreseeable future. And- she didn’t want to. Because- because for the first time in a lifetime she was among people who didn’t hold her as other. And she doesn’t want to risk losing that.

It was Véa who had found the solution to their problem, pressing Sunshine’s reins into Yennefer’s hands.

“Perhaps,” she had said loudly, “You should take Sunshine with you, if Roach refuses to enter your portal. He does not share her trepidation and will serve you well in her absence.” Sunshine had preened then, radiating a smug satisfaction. Yennefer had been certain that he had not understood the words, only the tone, but that had been enough. When she had mounted Sunshine and ridden through the portal, Roach had followed. And promptly bitten the other horse, but frankly Yennefer did not blame her for that.

Since that day, Roach had acquiesced readily enough to their trips, but she always found a way to communicate that she was not happy about it. Not at all, not one bit.

“How far is the Pankratz estate from the city?” Yennefer asks, shading her eyes and looking over at the clifftops. Véa has been there before, in her guise as Borch’s emissary. Sent to scout out the region.

“An hour’s ride to the East,” Véa replies. “But it is not the Pankratz estate. It is the Sobieski estate.”

“Sobieski?”

Véa nods. “Sobieski,” she confirms. “Julek’s mother was the one with the noble title. His father-”

“Was the dragon,” Yennefer finishes, and sighs. She isn’t sure when this became her life; riding out to investigate the possible murder of a dragon and his human wife on the request of another dragon. With whom she lives, along with her ex-lover, the princess of Cintra, two Zerrikanian warriors, and two young dragons, one of whom happens to be her ex-lover’s ex-travel companion. This is far from the life she imagined when she was a girl living in Vengerberg or a court mage in Aedirn. It is, however, one that she cannot imagine losing. 

“Pankratz or Sobieski, it doesn’t matter,” she says. “Either way, that is where we must go. You know,” she says, turning to face Véa. “If you had told me even a year ago that my life was to revolve around Jaskier’s family drama, I wouldn’t have believed you. Either that, or I would have cursed the bard on principle.”

“We would have met regardless,” Véa replies. “I am sworn to Villentretenmerth, and he is devoted to his son. You would have changed nothing; you would still be embroiled in his family drama. We would merely have been on opposite sides, for a time. Though I doubt that you would have cursed him with anything long-lasting, or truly dangerous.”

“Oh no?” Yennefer raises a brow. “How do you know that? The animosity between myself and Jaskier is legendary, after all. Perhaps I would have taken the opportunity to be rid of him forever. Spare myself some pain.”

“It would be humiliating,” Véa concedes. “And possibly long-lasting. But not malicious. You do not have it in you. Not unless provoked.”

“You underestimate the depths of my pettiness.”

“Perhaps. But I do not think so.”

Véa smiles at her, fierce and bright, and Yennefer’s heart skips a beat. “In any case, we will need your pettiness soon. Your pettiness, and your fierceness, and your passion. I have not met Marek Sobieski in person, but I have heard tales of him. No one would mourn if he were to suffer an…unfortunate and embarrassing curse.”

“We should get moving,” Yennefer says, brusquely, after a minute. “If we wish to be finished before dark. I need to renew the wards-”

“Yes,” Véa agrees, ducking her own head. “You are right. We shouldn’t waste time. Our mission is of the utmost importance. Though-” and she looks up at Yennefer, bright and mischievous, “-in that case, as surely the most logical thing would be to get there as fast as possible, may I propose a race?”

“A race?” Yennefer says. Despite herself, she can feel the sides of her mouth tug up in an inadvertent grin. There is no one around them, no one to be strong and sensible and serious for. Just the two of them, and the Redanian countryside, and the sea. “Well, if it’s more logical,” she says slowly, pretending to think on the matter-

-and then she leans forward and spurs Sunshine to a canter, the sound of Véa’s delighted laughter whisked away by the wind.


	2. Jaskier

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's really amazing seeing how many people have come back?? Hi again everyone! You're all great ❤️

Jaskier takes a deep breath, and out again. Feeling the air move through his body, the way that his muscles tense and relax as he breathes, the smell of the smoke and the pines and the roasting meat-

Roasting meat? Why is there the smell of roasting meat? They’ve already had breakfast, and in any case that is usually a thick porridge, sometimes sweetened with dried fruit and honey. If they’re lucky and if someone has been to market recently. Actually, how hard would it be to find honey using magic? After all, Yennefer is able to find _people;_ surely a beehive wouldn’t be that much different? Hmm, maybe he can ask her once she gets back. Or get Véa to ask her. That way they could have delicious, sweet, sticky honey every single day for breakfast, and not have to put up with preserved prune juice which, in his opinion, is utterly disgusting, no matter that Véa has a weird preference for it-

“Julian,” Borch rumbles. “I can hear you thinking from here.”

Jaskier opens one of his eyes, guiltily. Borch is sitting opposite him, looking down in fond amusement. He and Geralt had left straight mid-morning, not long after Yennefer and Véa, gone to collect more firewood, if he remembers correctly. Which is a strange thing to do, honestly- although they do have a fire blazing throughout the day, it’s mainly for cooking, instead of warmth. And Jaskier can’t remember them ever having to collect firewood for it before; it always just seemed to- appear. Whether that’s because he wasn’t paying attention or because with more of them stocks are running low faster, he can’t tell. 

_Why are you back so soon?_ he asks. _I thought that you were going to be gone for at least a few hours._

“It’s past noon,” Borch says. “Have you been meditating all this time?”

Past noon? Really? That’s- that’s hours! Glancing up, he can see that the sun is low in the sky and the shadows have lengthened around him. Huh. Maybe he isn’t as bad at this meditation stuff as he thought.

_I didn’t realise that I’d been doing it this long,_ he says. He stretches, luxuriating in the feeling after, apparently, hours of stillness. His joints ache, but they’ve been doing that recently; maybe he’s caught a chill. _If only my old tutors could see me now,_ he says, _they wouldn’t believe it. The amount of trouble they had, trying to get to me stay still! I wouldn’t, of course. Their threats only made me more eager to escape from their grasp. I was very creative as well, I’ll have you know. Good at climbing out of windows and hiding in small spaces._

“I believe you,” Borch says, reaching down and nuzzling Jaskier. Who sighs in contentment and lies down on his front, spreading his wings hopefully. His father indulges him and gently scratches his claws down Jaskier’s back, right in the itchiest spots that that he can never reach on his own. He wriggles in delight; it feels good. Incredibly good. His skin has been increasingly itchy, recently. Nothing unmanageable, but sometimes all he wants to do it rub himself against the rough bark of the pine trees, or soak in one of the pools, letting the heat of the dragon fire-warmed water soak into his skin and alleviate the feeling.

His stomach grumbles, and Jaskier groans. He doesn’t know what’s wrong with him! He’s been _starving_ recently, wolfing down his own portions in minutes then spending the rest of the meal staring longingly at everyone else’s food. He’s tried to hide it- not even _Saskia_ or Geralt is eating as much as him for Melitele’s sake!- but he isn’t doing a very good job of it, judging by the second, and sometimes third helpings, he’s given. And the way that there’s always a good portion or two of ‘leftovers’ placed somewhere conspicuous. Or the fact that whenever he sees Téa or Véa they generally give him some form of food, even if it’s only fried jerky. He has a sneaking suspicion that the reason that Geralt and Borch spend so much time hunting or buying more stores of food might be _him_ and his inexplicably large appetite. Enough to eat them out of house and home, though no one has said so.

“Time for more food,” Borch says, leaning down to nudge him into standing. He does so sulkily, shaking his wings out and folding them neatly behind him.

_I’m not hungry,_ Jaskier says, but neither of them believes him. His stomach choosing that exact moment to rumble doesn’t exactly help his case.

“You haven’t eaten for several hours. And you’ve been meditating; that takes energy.”

_It’s just sitting around and not thinking. Hardly the stuff of legends._

“Lots of energy,” Borch says firmly, chivvying him along. “We have plenty of food, and you’re going to eat it. Besides, it’s the noon meal. Everyone has been waiting for you; it would be rude to keep them waiting, fledgling.”

Jaskier gives in. It’s not that he doesn’t want to eat- in fact another meal sounds like just the thing. It’s more that he’s _embarrassed._

_I spent most of my life on three meals a day- fewer than three meals a lot of the time! And that was when I was travelling all day, not just sitting at home and meditating,_ he complains. _I don’t understand where all the energy is going._

Still, despite his words, it takes all of his self-control not to inhale the stew put in front of him, and he doesn’t make more than a token complaint when Geralt places a second bowl of stew next to him without a word, sending a grudging _thanks_ at him.

_Are you sure that I’m learning to transform back into a human and not a halfling?_ he asks, licking the last of the gravy from the bowl. _Because I never felt this hungry, ever, when I was a human._

Opposite him, Ciri snorts behind her own bowl of stew. “Sorry,” she apologises, through a wad of bread, having cheerfully abandoned all royal propriety a few days after having arrived. “It’s just you sound so _grumpy._ ”

Jaskier sticks his tongue out at her- to her delight- and pads over to her, flopping against her and enjoying the feel of her fingers scratching around his horns.

_I always sound like this,_ he says. _This is just my natural tone of voice_.

“I don’t believe that,” Ciri says. “Geralt, Jaskier is saying that he’s eternally grumpy, and I don’t think that’s true.”

“No, he’s telling the truth,” Geralt replies blandly. “He _is_ always like that.” He breaks a moment later, when Jaskier throws _shockoffense_ at his mind, ducking his head to hide his smile and sending waves of reassurance back.

_Ciri, tell him that at least I’m making better progress at him when it comes to reopening communication channels._

“I don’t know,” Ciri says, thoughtfully. “I think _I’m_ the one who’s doing best at communicating.” That is 100% true, in that she’s the only one who’s been able to consistently hear him but- rude!

_Well, if you feel that way,_ he says, _I suppose that means you don’t want my help going over your maths, then?_

Ciri immediately turns her own pleading gaze on him; she hates arithmetic with a burning passion, but unfortunately for her that doesn’t mean that she _doesn’t_ need to learn it. Fundamentally, when you get down to it, a lot of magic is rooted in mathematics, much to everyone’s disgust. Jaskier shares Ciri’s distaste for the subject but having finished his own education in the Seven Liberal Arts- which include both geometry and arithmetic- at Oxenfurt he can at least help explain the basics. It’s a nice break from the anatomy books that are his own homework, as he tries to memorise what goes where and how it all works, something he needs to learn if he wants learn to transform back into a human sooner than the decades that Borch had predicted.

Jaskier doesn’t break under her look. He’s strong. He can endure.

“Geralt,” Ciri says. “You’re the worst at communicating, Jaskier is a lot better than you. Though I’m still better than both of you.”

_Not exactly what I asked for, but I’ll take it._

“Good,” says Ciri. “Because I still have no idea what a cosine is.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last night, I spent a lot of time at stupid o' clock worrying about tonal whiplash as we move between POVs, but eh. I'll make it work somehow.


	3. Yennefer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have I mentioned that you guys are literally the reason that I am motivated to update? Because you are and I am always so happy and honoured and grateful?

The walls of the Sobieski estate are high and imposing. Made of smooth, dark stone, they must have cost a fortune. They are also remarkably well-kept; no crumbling corners nor clinging vines, the only thing that Yennefer can see is a glossy expanse of stone, impossible to climb. Impossible to cross. Acting on a hunch, Yennefer feels the air just above the stone. Magic tingles on her hand, strong and sure. Old, not something that had been renewed recently, but potent nonetheless.

“The stones are infused with magic,” Yennefer says out loud. She closes her eyes and concentrates, continuing to narrate all the while. “I can’t tell who cast it- though you would be surprised what mages leave of themselves in their spells- but I can tell that it was someone who was well trained. They’ve keyed them into a family line- probably through the blood. They must have been trained at Aretuza or Ban Ard; they knew what they were doing. This was no hedgewitch.” It’s beautiful to her eyes, the strands of the protective spell woven so tightly together that it looks like the stones are gilded. Not a spell that she’s seen before, but then she wasn’t concentrating on that kind of magic in her studies. No, she was more interested in learning the most powerful spells, the ones fuelled by aggression and talent, that only the strongest could master. She had thought that protective spells, anything beyond the fundamentals, were useless to her; after all, she could simply overwhelm her opponents.

It’s only now that she’s found herself as part of a group who attracts trouble as easily as breathing that she’s found cause to regret this philosophy.

“Is that usual?” Véa asks. She’s standing quietly next to the horses; Yennefer can feel her as well. Now that she’s looking. Véa is not magical, but she has spent most of her adult life around an intensely magical creature, and to those sensitive enough to the eddies of Chaos, that leaves a mark. Yennefer is, false modesty aside, the best mage of her generation, and possibly one of the best that Aretuza has ever trained.

“No,” Yennefer says, refocusing on the stone wall. “Most of us are offered places at court and then never leave. Enchanting a wealthy lord’s wall? It would be insulting. Beneath us. There are few people who would stoop to that level. Not unless there was a rather large incentive.”

She, of course, is no exception. But then she is no pampered nobleman’s third daughter, sent to the isle of Thanedd to bring glory to the family name. No merchant’s beloved child waved off by her doting parents, proud of her magical ability. She is the daughter of a cruel man and a passive woman, unloved and unacknowledged and sold for four marks, less than the pigs that her father sold at market. Her incentives would be markedly different. But she knows that if the price was right, she too would be willing to do monstrous things.

…maybe not spending hours enchanting hunks of stone, though. Monstrous things yes, tedious ones? Perhaps not.

“What kind of incentive?” Véa has come to stand beside her; Yennefer can feel her body heat. Feel the small flurries of air disturbed by her movements.

“I don’t know,” Yennefer says, opening her eyes and turning to look at her. “I really don’t. But somehow I think we’re going to find out.”

“You think it’s something sinister?”

“I don’t see how it can be anything but.” She gestures at the walls, gleaming in the afternoon sun. “Look at them. These are exorbitantly expensive. This sort of money- a king could gather that much, perhaps. If he raised taxes and stopped buying whores, limited the number of feasts, stopped playing at war… A lord? Even one who taxed a previously wealthy port? It’s doubtful indeed.”

“Then he has something to hide, and powerful friends who are willing to ensure his safety.”

Yennefer steps away from the wall. There’s nothing else that she can gleam from it; the magic is too old. Years, certainly. Decades, perhaps. Not more than a century. Long enough that the scent of the magic has faded.

“Extremely powerful friends. This kind of long-lasting protective magic… it would take me a year to enchant the entirety of this wall. If there were hmm five mages working in concert? Perhaps a few months.”

“Then it is must be powerful magic indeed,” Véa says. The two of them have made it back to the horses and as Yennefer watches in bemusement, she reaches into Roach’s saddlebag and takes several wrapped packages and a blanket.

“What are you doing?” Yennefer asks.

Véa doesn’t look up from where she’s spreading placing the blanket on the ground, weighing it down at the corners so that it doesn’t blow away. It’s not a fine blanket; it’s made of a tightly woven hemp cloth painted with linseed oil, stiff and watertight and perfect for sitting on.

“It’s time for food,” she says, simply. “Ciri helped me pack lunch. We will sit on this blanket and discuss our next moves.” The parcels, once unwrapped, prove to be simple fare. Slices of meat between plain bread cut into different shapes; circles, triangles, a credible attempt at a horse. A handful of nuts each, some dried fruit.

Yennefer sits and takes the food.

The cloth, the food- they’re nothing compared to some of the luxuries that Yennefer has been treated to over the course of her life. When she was Aedirn’s court mage, her picnics- if they were seated on the ground and not in a grand pavilion hastily erected by servants- were eaten sitting on cloth-of-gold, the food rich pigeon pies and exotic fruits. But somehow Ciri’s truly horrendous attempts to make their lunch more interesting taste better than the finest pâtés.

“We shouldn’t meet with the Count today,” Yennefer says, once there is nothing left but crumbs. “I don’t know anything about him, and that concerns me. We need to know more about him.”

“Agreed,” Véa says, picking the dried figs out from her pile of fruit. Wordlessly, Yennefer hands her own figs to the other woman, claiming her untouched raisins in trade. “He will not want to talk to us. We will need to optimise the time spent talking with him.”

She pauses a moment, looking at the walls thoughtfully. “Yennefer,” she asks. “Could you breach those wards?”

“Yes,” Yennefer says immediately. “But not without alerting the residents. Although…” reaching out, she once again contemplates the golden web. There are rough patches, places where the weave is unravelling. “If I had Jaskier’s help, the chances at getting in undetected would increase exponentially.”

Véa frowns, and Yennefer knows that if anyone else had suggested it that the Zerrikanian would have objected. Immediately.

“What would he have to do?” Véa asks eventually.

“Nothing dangerous. I would infuse two amulets with a drop of his blood; that way that wards would recognise us as family, as belonging, and allow us entry without anyone knowing. We would, however, have to tell him what we’re doing.”

Véa nods, solemnly. “We would have to anyway,” she says. “Now that we have found something strange… Secrets have a habit of revealing themselves at the worst of times. And I would rather that Julek was not left unprepared.”

Yennefer snorts, stretching out on the cloth. It’s not the prettiest thing, but it is amazingly efficient at keeping her clothes dry and safe from the damp soil underneath them.

“I have some friends,” she says, staring at the sky. There are clouds coming in on the horizon. “From my time in court. They might know more about Sobieski. We shouldn’t ask Jaskier. Not about that. Not unless you want an angry Witcher scowling at you all evening.”

“Truly, the worst of fates.” There’s a rustle of clothing and then Véa is lying next to her. “Tomorrow, perhaps,” she suggests. “Today, we can look around the estate and see if there are any other surprises we should be aware of. Then we can return, and you can enchant those amulets.”

“That sounds like a sensible plan.”

“Of course it is. It’s my plan.”

Neither of them moves for a long moment. They just stay there, lying together, and looking up at the sky.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> By the way, I now have hit 300 followers on Tumblr (what the heck) and was wondering if anyone would be interested in me doing a kind of 'director's commentary' on a chapter/story? And if so, which one?


	4. Jaskier

To his surprise, Jaskier remembers what a cosine is. And a sine, for that matter. Something of his Oxenfurt education had stuck, though considering that he’d spent the majority of it climbing out of windows and not turning up for tutorials, that was a miracle. It wasn’t his fault! His lecturers would never accept the fact that he just _knew_ the answers; just because he wasn’t able to show them exactly how he’d got to the correct response didn’t mean that he’d cheated! In the end, it was a lot easier on everyone (and especially on his poor, abused hands) if he just stopped turning up for lessons.

Of course, it’s easier to explain his methodology now that he can just show Ciri his thought process. That would have been a lot more useful at Oxenfurt, although thinking on it there were _many_ things he wouldn’t have wanted his teachers accidentally spotting in his brain, so perhaps it was for the best that he hadn’t had the option.

They spend the afternoon like that; chasing the best and warmest patches of sunshine to lounge in while Ciri does her sums and Jaskier concentrates on his anatomy books and, now that Borch is back, to manipulate his own larynx. He’s not allowed to do so when he’s on his own, and honestly he has no complaints there. If he gets something wrong and starts to accidentally choke- a completely hypothetical example that he definitely hasn’t had nightmares about- then he wants someone who knows what they’re doing around to help him reverse it.

Geralt watches over both of them from the corner, wood shavings scattered around his feet as he patiently carves a small figurine; to Jaskier’s eyes, it looks like a horse. Possibly Roach. And that is just too adorable. So much so that he keeps getting distracted glancing over and watching Geralt’s hands as the block of wood slowly gains shape.

The sky is a deep pink, shot through with wispy clouds, when Yennefer and Véa return. The portal opens in its usual spot by the waterfall and they come riding through, Sunshine first and then Roach.

“Yennefer!” Ciri calls out, running over to her with her slate and chalk in hand, not even giving Yennefer time to dismount. “Look, I’ve finished my work. And it’s right this time, I’m certain. Can I _please_ do some more magic now?”

Ciri chatters, cheerful as a bubbling brook, her voice rising up and down in her enthusiasm. Yennefer is well and truly trapped, though she at least negotiates her dismount before the two of them sit down- right where the portal had opened- and start going over Ciri’s work.

“She’s good with her,” Geralt says, from where he’s evidently decided to give Jaskier a _heart attack._ No matter his improved senses and telepathic link, Geralt seems to delight in creeping up on him unnoticed. One day, Jaskier vows, he will be able to do the same thing, and once that day comes Geralt will know no peace. That day is far off, so instead he contents himself with climbing up Geralt until he reaches his shoulders and settling down.

_She is,_ Jaskier says, trying to send the words through as slowly and clearly as possible. _Your Child Surprise is easy to love, though._

He doesn’t think that Geralt gets the words exactly but judging from the pleased ‘hmm’ he at least gets the sentiment.

“It’s my turn to cook,” Geralt says. “Help me?” Jaskier nudges his head against Geralt’s in fond acquiescence- both of them know that Geralt needs no help- and flings himself off his shoulder, gliding down to land near the vegetable garden. The leeks look ready; it’ll be nice to have some fresh vegetables to complement their endless diet of stew. He starts to dig a couple out, careful not to get _too_ much dirt stuck under his scales; he still can’t bear the itch. Though it is nice when he can soak in one of the pools and have Geralt gently clean them for him…

He’s just got the first one out when something knocks straight into him, sending him sprawling into the dirt. 

_Saskia!_ He says, shaking himself off- something that is made more difficult as she’s clinging to his back. _I was busy!_

It is good to see her; Borch has been taking her out to go flying with him in the afternoons. Jaskier, of course, could also go along with them, but- There’s something that shivers inside him as the thought of leaving the safety of the cave. It’s extremely unlikely that there’s going to be another storm, there’s no way that he’ll get lost _again_ , but- That’s logic, and there’s a piece of him that’s not able to accept logic yet. And he gets plenty of exercise flying around the cave.

Saskia doesn’t pay any attention to his protestations; the thought that anyone could be busy doing something not dedicated to her is an entirely foreign concept to her. Instead she looks at the dirt now covering him and Jaskier can just _see_ the thought enter her head.

_Wait,_ he says, _I need to finish digging these out-_

But it’s too late because Saskia dives at the dirt, rolling around in it until her scales are filthy and covered in a thin patina of brown. She chirps up at him, wriggling happily.

_Bath!_ She says. She sounds entirely too pleased at the concept; he doesn’t remember being that eager for baths when he was her age. Then again, he can’t actually remember what he was like at that age, and doesn’t have anyone he can ask, so who knows?

_You’re spoilt, Saskia,_ he says. _Utterly spoilt. One day you’re going to meet someone those wide eyes don’t work on, and then you’re going to have to heat your own baths._

Today is not that day. He sighs digs out the other leek; much more quickly this time. If he’s going to have to heat up a pool then he’s damn well going to take advantage of the hot water himself. And Saskia can’t reach some of her back on her own. She’ll need the help. It’s practically a public service that he’s providing.

_Let me just give these to Geralt_ , he says. Saskia narrows her eyes and huffs at him. Her tail snaps out and hit Jaskier on the side of his head.

_What was that for! You’re going to have to get on with him eventually, Saskia…_ He knows that it’s his fault that Saskia hates Geralt with a burning, passionate fire that has only slightly dimmed, and he knows that it’s because she loves him (and there is a part of him that preens and melts every time that he realises it anew). However, she’s already bitten Geralt three times, not including their first meeting, and they really do need to get this sorted before she becomes any bigger. Nip this notion that biting people is an acceptable way of disliking people in the bud.

_Mine!_ Saskia says. _My Julek. Mine._ And then she climbs onto his back- spreading mud all the while- and refuses to get off.

Jaskier looks futilely at his leeks. Then at the wide expanse between the vegetable garden and the front cave. Weighs up how likely it is that Saskia will bite him if it looks like he’s going anywhere _but_ the nearest pool. Then he sighs and sends out that unique mixture of _apologyresignation(love)_ that seems to characterise his interactions with Geralt whenever Saskia is around and hopes that the Witcher understands what he’s trying to say. Which he more than likely will; this is far from the first time this has happened.

Oh well. At least he’s getting a bath out of this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jaskier: *thinks of Geralt*  
> Saskia: *narrows eyes*  
> Saskia: Mine! mine, mine, mine, no fair, mine. Get your own brother.


	5. Yennefer

Yennefer waits until after dinner to broach the subject with Jaskier. She and Ciri had taken an hour to go over her work, pointing out mistakes and praising the concepts that she had taken to. Yennefer’s teaching style is largely based on thinking about how miserable she had been at Aretuza and doing exactly the opposite of her teachers there. By the time they were both satisfied that Ciri had understood the concepts, it was late and time for the evening meal.

It’s when Téa and Véa are guiding Ciri and Geralt- though mostly Geralt- through the meditation needed to open their minds to telepathic communication that she goes to stand by Jaskier, who’s curled almost inside the fire and watching them the others. He glances up at her approach, ears twitching slightly. Now that she’s closer, she can see that he’s got his sister- still and quite possibly asleep- tucked between his legs.

“Jaskier,” she says, quietly. “I need to speak to you. In private.”

_Can it wait? I’m a little busy at the moment._

“If he hasn’t managed to do it for the past week, then I doubt that Geralt is going to manage telepathic communication this evening.”

Jaskier bristles defensively. _He’s doing a lot better! In fact, I’m sure that he managed to understand me just yesterday- Granted it was when I was telling him about the anatomy of the larynx, and how much I enjoyed the word ‘epiglottis’ and can’t wait to say it, out loud, using my vocal cords and he just said ‘hmm’ and sent reassurance at me, but I am certain that at least some of what I was saying got through-_

“Jaskier,” Yennefer says. Jaskier stops talking- something that has become even rarer now that he doesn’t have the physical limitations of having to breath holding him back- and looks at her.

_Oh,_ he says. And there must have been something in her tone or on her face that convinced him of the importance of what she wants to say because, without another word, he starts untangling himself from his sister. She grumbles, looking on the verge of wakefulness, but then Ciri moves over and takes Saskia in her own lap, stroking her back gently.

“Meet me by the waterfall when you’re done,” she says. Across the fire, Véa looks up at her, eyebrows raised in a clear question. Yennefer shakes her head in response. She doesn’t need help. She’s got this. Although, perhaps she isn’t the only one who should be here.

“Borch!” She calls out, keeping her voice low. The great golden dragon looks up, his eyes bright gold and staring straight at her. Yennefer carefully doesn’t shiver. She isn’t afraid of Borch, but neither has she forgiven him entirely. For what, she’s not certain; being the worst relationship councillor since the last Conjunction, perhaps. Crushing her ambitions beneath his feet on that mountain. There’s also something unsettling in that reptilian gaze, something that makes the primal side of her brain sit up and take notice. It’s the feeling of danger, a shiver down her spine, the knowledge that should he choose he could crush her as easily as she could swat a fly. She knows that Geralt feels that way too; she can see it sometimes in the way his muscles bunch and tense and he stays perfectly still. He never says anything, though, and neither does she. She’ll manage. She’ll adjust. Because she’s finally found a group of people who _need_ her, and she’s not letting them go easily.

“Yennefer,” Borch rumbles back. _What do you need?_

Steeling herself, she opens her mind to him, showing him the events of the day, the conclusions that she and Véa had come to. _It will be better if we talk to your son together,_ she says. It’s still strange to call Jaskier that, but she has noticed that doing so always puts Borch in a- not good per se, but more relaxed mood. And she can’t deny that Jaskier is his son. No matter how it happened.

_You are correct, Yennefer of Vengerberg,_ Borch replies, making no indication which thought he is replying to, and gets to his own feet, stretching luxuriously. Wordlessly, she follows him.

The waterfall, although it is the perfect place for covert conversations, is rather cold and damp, the fine spray of water quickly soaking them. Such is the cost of privacy. Borch smirks at her, and then with a _snap_ extends one of his wings to shelter them both.

“…thank you,” she says begrudgingly, forbearing from mentioning that she could have sheltered them both with a spell has she so chosen.

“You’re welcome,” Borch replies, equally polite.

And then they stand there in awkward silence- at least on Yennefer’s end, though she has a sneaking suspicion that Borch is just amused- until Jaskier arrives.

_Sorry!_ he says, _I’m sorry, Saskia woke up and didn’t want me to go, but she’s settled now._

Jaskier settles himself between Borch’s legs, looking up at Yennefer with curious, blue eyes. His eyes were one of the things that convinced her that the dragon she had encountered in Cintra _was_ Geralt’s bard and wasn’t just the consequence of a malfunctioning spell. That and his mind, leaking pain and worry and fear, and battering against her senses with the delicacy of a sledgehammer.

“Jaskier,” she says. “Véa and I have been investigating Lettenhove. More specifically what happened to your parents.”

Silence.

_Well, that was certainly… to the point,_ Jaskier says weakly. His shoulders are hunched, wings mantled, and tail wrapped tightly around himself. Borch curls his own free wing around him and Jaskier leans into it.

“I asked them to,” Borch says, and Jaskier goes abruptly still, pulling away from his embrace. The sting of betrayal batters against Yennefer’s mind and she winces in pain. Somehow, even when he can’t physically speak, Jaskier manages to be so very loud. “I want to know whether you’re in danger, Julian. Could a group of bandits defeat full-grown dragon, even one taken off guard? Perhaps. But it’s unlikely. And if it wasn’t a bandit attack, then I would know who it was instead, and why. Because if you’re in danger then I want to know.”

_Because that could put Saskia in danger._

Borch snorts and nuzzles Jaskier, settling himself down and curling his forearms around him until his tense posture softens. “Because it could put _you_ in danger, fledgling,” he says.

_Oh,_ Jaskier says, and his voice is small.

“My son,” Borch says, and fond exasperation fills the air. “Don’t you remember that I would do anything to keep you safe from any danger.”

There’s a beat, and then Jaskier breaks, throwing himself at Borch and burrowing deeper into his embrace. Borch around him, and they breathe together, Jaskier’s emotions steadying and calming. It’s only a moment, and then Jaskier looks back up at Yennefer, his eyes wide and inquisitive. 

_That- makes sense. But- the thing I don’t understand, Yennefer is why are you telling me this? You wouldn’t tell me- there has to be a reason. Otherwise you’d just- do it._

“Because I need your blood,” Yennefer says. It’s better to get things out in the open, lest they fester and rot, misunderstanding after misunderstanding piling up until there’s nothing left but pain. She does think that she’s made a mistake, though, when she hears the low growl emanating from Borch. Who’s staring at her, eyes narrowed, and teeth bared.

Ah. Possibly not the best thing to bring up around a dragon whose entire species was hunted for spare parts.

“There are some powerful wards around your grandfather’s estate and a drop of blood- two drops of blood so that I can make two amulets- would allow me to bypass the wards.” Yennefer speaks quickly and clearly, lowering her own shields so that the dragons can hear the sincerity of her words.

_Just a drop of blood?_ Jaskier asks, _And you won’t be able to bind me with it, or use it for tracking spells, or do something awful to me?_

“I’m honoured by your faith in me,” Yennefer says drily. “No, it would only be to infuse the amulets. Nothing else.”

_Then yes,_ Jaskier says. _Two drops of blood? That’s nothing. You can have that on one condition._

Yennefer feels a curl of pre-emptive dread in her stomach. “What is it?” she asks, hoping that it’ll be something easy like a new doublet, or some lute strings, or the secret to eternal youth.

_I want to go with you._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mean, everyone saw that coming, right? Jaskier, nooooooo


	6. Jaskier

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please note that I have updated the tags! 
> 
> CW: panic attacks in this chapter, (starting at ' _I can do this,_ Jaskier says, desperate). I'll put a mini summary of the chapter in the end notes for anyone who wants to skip that bit.

“No!”

The denial is immediate, Borch and Yennefer’s voices overlapping and united in their disapproval. Nevertheless, Jaskier stands fast. He wriggles his way out of his father’s embrace so that he can stand before them, looking them both in the eye. Show them his resolve, his determination.

_It’s my blood,_ he says. _And my family, and grandfather, and my past. If my parents weren’t killed by bandits- then that means that I’ve been lied to my entire life. And if that’s the case then I want to know why._

Jaskier is not being overdramatic, he’s not. Because it’s no exaggeration to say that his entire life has been defined by that one moment, that one moment where his father bent over to kiss him, lying safe in his mother’s arms, that one moment of calm before the carriage was overturned and there was blood and violence and hatred.

It’s a miracle, he’s been told all his life, that the bandits had missed him. That he had remained sheltered in his mother’s arms for all those hours until his grandfather had realised that something was wrong sent a search party after them. That he hadn’t been killed by bandits, by the cold, by wild animals drawn to the scene of the slaughter.

It was a good thing, he’d hear people whisper, that he was too young to remember them. His parents. Easier to make the transition. Why wouldn’t he be happy living with his grandfather, when he hadn’t known anything else? Why couldn’t he be happy, living his pampered life behind the high walls of the Sobieski estate? Why couldn’t he appreciate the security that was his? Taken in despite his parentage, given the best education, never having to go hungry or thirsty… Why would such an ungrateful child run off and leave his grandfather, in his dotage?

Whispers and rumours and a thousand small cuts.

“Jaskier,” Yennefer says. “You haven’t left this cave in a week. Why would you think you can handle going back to Lettenhove? I could be wrong-” the expression on her face indicates that she very much doubts that she’s wrong- “but I doubt you’ve been back there in years.”

Jaskier shrinks back because- yes, ok maybe he hasn’t been back to Lettenhove since he left for Oxenfurt. Maybe he hasn’t heard from his grandfather since the day he graduated. When he took the fine vellum summons that had been delivered to his room and had shredded it, scattering scraps of disappointment and duty and responsibility out of his window. Maybe he hasn’t set eyes on the man since he left Oxenfurt; climbed out of his window with nothing on him but his lute and the clothes on his back, leaving his letter of resignation on the Chancellor’s desk at the first indication that his grandfather was _there._ In the same city.

It might have been a slight overreaction, but Jaskier remembered his window, nailed shut. Remembered the high walls, impossible to climb. And didn’t want to take any chances.

_I can,_ he says regardless, trying to stamp down his fears. Banish them from his mind. _It’s only a place- I wouldn’t even have to see him- He could be dead now! It’s been years-_

There’s a warmth in his mind, an enquiry, a show of support, and Jaskier clings to it despite himself. He doesn’t need Geralt coming over here and being overprotective at him, but he can’t help but lean into that support. He needs a moment. Just one moment.

“Say I believed you,” Yennefer continues, inexorable. “That your relationship with your family is perfectly fine, despite everything. What makes you think that I would bring you to a place that a dragon has already died.”

Jaskier’s breath catches in his throat. _I-_

“Enough,” Borch rumbles, as solid and implacable as a mountain. He leans forward and grabs Jaskier by the nape of his neck, pulling him back toward him and back into the shelter of his wings. “If you will excuse us, Yennefer,” he continues. “I believe that my son and I have to talk.”

Yennefer nods, her violet eyes cool and assessing. “Come and find me afterward, Jaskier,” she says. “If you’re still willing to donate that blood. If not-” she hesitates, and a flash of something soft that crosses her face, “-if not then don’t worry about it. You don’t have to; I’ll figure something out.” And then she’s gone, no doubt back to the fire and the warmth to sit by Véa’s side and mock Geralt’s lack of progress.

_I can do this,_ Jaskier says, desperate. _Please, I can do this. I need to see- I need to know- I can’t-_ He breaks off, unable to articulate the swarming thoughts in his head. Fuck! He’s meant to be articulate; he’s meant to be a wordsmith for Melitele’s sake, and yet here he is. Paralysed by the conflicting emotions thrumming through his body.

He’s shaking, he’s shaking and he can’t feel his father’s warmth around, all he can feel is the cold of the ground, the stickiness of his mother’s blood seeping through his clothes to rest against his skin, the heat of his stone the only thing breaking through his numbness-

And then _warmth_ breaks through; warmth and Geralt’s fierce concern, and Saskia’s alarm, and around it all, covering and protecting him is Borch, his father, his father, but isn’t his father dead? Isn’t his father lying prone of the floor, the light faded from his eyes, so how can he also be here, shouting his name ( _Julian! Julian!_ )-

There are other voices now, shouting at him. Jaskier and Julek and Julian and son and bard and brother and friend all mixed and swirling around him-

The world seems to shrink and expand at the same time and he feels sick, dizzy, unbalanced, unmoored-

But there’s a warm body pressed against him, soft scales burrowing in under his wings. There’s a steady presence above him, heart beating steady and sure. And there is warmth and support and love filling his mind, steadily soothing the panic and the pain.

Jaskier shudders, but they don’t leave. They don’t recoil at his pain, they don’t demand that he push past the weakness- they just _are._ They wait and they reassure; they will be there for as long as he needs them, that they will keep him safe, that they won’t ever leave. That there is no limit to their love. And with one last shuddering breath, Jaskier can feel his mind calm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mini chapter summary: Yennefer refuses to allow Jaskier to come with her. Jaskier argues and wants to come. He gets upset at the memories that Lettenhove and his grandfather bring up, and when trying to convince Borch to let him go, has a panic attack, with memories of his parents' death interweaving with the present. His family help him through this, but it is not a good time for him. 
> 
> Jaskier's sections were meant to be the heartwarming, domestic bits of the story, and I can only apologise for the angst that has crept in. I don't even know how it got there.


	7. Yennefer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One week after I poster the first chapter, and I just want to say a huge thank you to everyone who's read, left kudos, and/or commented! You're all amazing and I love you and I always feel like I'm repeating myself so much when I write these notes, but are all just really great.

Yennefer and Véa step out of the portal and into a (relatively) quiet side street. Yennefer doesn’t have the enhanced senses of a Witcher, but the smell is still overwhelming- nothing like the lightly pine-scented air of the mountain cave that is, surprisingly, becoming more and more a home to her.

Not that Vizima smells bad; no, here in the Trade Quarter the mingled scents of roasting meat, toasted nuts, and mulled cider are actually quite pleasant. Yennefer suspects, however, that this has more to do with the fact that the richest citizens of Vizima live in the Trade Quarter; Melitele forfend they have to put up with the smell of shit in the streets. She snorts to herself. Instead they’d push it to the outskirts of the city, banish the non-humans to Old Vizima and pretend that they don’t exist. Gild the giant pile of shit that the entire city is perched upon. 

“Your friend lives here?” Véa asks, as they exit the alley and start to make their way through the market. Hawkers and stallholders shout after them, trying to tempt them to sample their wares. Yennefer ignores them with the ease of long practice; her fashionable dresses paint a pretty picture of wealth that shopkeepers never hesitate to take advantage of.

“She lives in the Royal Quarter,” Yennefer says. “But there it’s considered rude to just portal in, so we’ll have to take the long way around instead.”

“You are not the sort of person who cares about being rude,” Véa says, following her behind her. She doesn’t sound accusatory, only faintly amused. Yennefer smiles- something she’s found herself doing more and more often over the past few weeks.

“No,” she says. “I’m not. But Triss is an old friend, and more importantly she has the information that I need.”

“An old friend?” Véa moves forward until she's walking next to Yennefer. The bustle of the busy marketplace means that the two of them have to walk close; so close that Yennefer can feel the heat of Véa’s body pressing into her side.

“Yes,” she says, determined not to be distracted. “We went to school together. Triss can be naïve, but she…isn’t a bad person. And she’s been part of the Temerian court for decades; if there’s anything to know about the Sobieski family, she’ll be able to find it.”

“The Temerian court? Would she know about a relatively minor family from Redania?”

Yennefer smirks. “If there’s one thing that court mages love to do, it’s gossip. Trust me, Triss will know exactly what’s going on.”

#

Triss hasn’t changed. Not that any of them really _change_ ; on the contrary, they stagnate. Constant as the mountains, and just as dull; dealing with the same insipid problems across the generations and deriving all their joy from the petty gossip and the pettier squabbles. Obsessed with maintaining the status quo and the miserable trickle of power that matter less and less every passing day. It’s no wonder that Yennefer hasn’t kept in better contact with any of her old coterie, and that’s not taking into account the fact that the majority of her old classmates actively despise her.

Triss though… Triss hasn’t yet succumbed to the monotony of her position. She still believes that she can make a difference, that anything she does will matter at all, and is therefore tolerable and even pleasant to talk to.

“Yennefer!” she cries out when she sees them, hurrying forward and pressing a kiss to both her cheeks. “And who’s this?” she asks, looking at Véa who, once they had arrived at the gates to the Royal Quarter, had fallen back behind Yennefer to glower at the guards, one hand on the hilt of her sword. She hadn’t moved from that position; not once they were allowed entry, not when her sword was confiscated, and not on the walk to Triss’ quarters.

“Véa, this is Triss Merigold, the old friend I was telling you about,” Yennefer says. “Triss, this is Véa. She’s a friend.”

There’s a faint, imperceptible hesitation before the word ‘friend’; one that Yennefer hopes that Véa hasn’t noticed, but that Triss most assuredly has. Her friend doesn’t say anything, though; just looks between the two of them and moves forward to give Véa an equally enthusiastic greeting.

“How good it is to meet you!” Triss says. “I haven’t met many of Yennefer’s friends, so I am especially glad to meet _you._ ”

Véa bears it with good grace, only shooting Yennefer one incredulous glance. Yennefer shrugs her own shoulders; Triss is just like that. There’s nothing to be done but endure.

“Now,” Triss says after a moment of uncomfortable affection. “What was it you wanted to talk to me about?”

She gestures towards her living area where there are a cluster of chairs- fashionable but not the uncomfortable monstrosities that are so prevalent at court. Yennefer sits, then pulls Véa forward to sit beside her when the Zerrikanian looks like she’s about to take a seat behind her. Again. If Yennefer wanted someone to follow her reverentially, she would have stuck with Sir Eyck.

“I wanted to know about the Sobieski family,” Yennefer says. “Specifically an event that happened hmm, about forty years ago.”

“Oh,” Triss says, her cheerful façade fading slightly. “You mean the murders.”

“Murders?” Véa asks. “Then they are acknowledged as such?”

“Mm, yes,” Triss says, fiddling with one of her bracelets. “It was said to be an accident, of course. A tragic accident. But for both Aniela and her husband to be killed? Weeks after they refused to give Julian to Marek to foster? Marek is many things, but stupid isn’t one of them. And he was powerful, back then. Powerful and arrogant. It was quite the talk of the Temerian court; how one of the richest Redanian landowners had had his own daughter and son-in-law assassinated.”

“And King Vizimir didn’t do anything about it?” Yennefer asks the question as a matter of course; there are many reasons a king would not attack a rich subject. There’s a strange burning in the pit of her stomach, a simmering rage that is threatening to overcome her. She stamps down on it, viciously. Now is not the time.

“What would he do? Marek Sobieski was providing at least a quarter of the Crown’s revenue. And he wasn’t anywhere near the incident; he spent the day holed up in his estate and Aniela’s carriage was attacked on the road back from Lettenhove.”

Véa snorts. “As though that means anything,” she says. “That sort of man would not stoop to doing his own dirty work.”

“No, he wouldn’t,” Yennefer agrees. “But that means that the king couldn’t arrest him. Not without a long and expensive enquiry.” One that he could ill afford, if the said supporter was supplying his lavish lifestyle. It’s always the way; a woman’s life is a simple enough price to pay if the alternative is losing even the smallest of luxuries. Hidden from Triss’ view, Véa places a soft hand on Yennefer’s leg, and she controls herself.

“And he would not want to alienate one of his most powerful supporters,” Véa says, and Yennefer smiles at her.

“No,” Triss agrees. “He wouldn’t. And certainly not over something that could be classed as a personal affair.”

The arm of the chair that Véa is sitting on creaks, the leather warped beneath the warrior’s hand. “Personal matters?” she asks, voice low and dangerous. Yennefer, her hand hidden under the drape of her fashionable dress, squeezes Véa’s hand warningly. 

“Yes,” Triss says, and Yennefer gives her begrudging credit; she looks Véa straight in the eyes and doesn’t flinch at the anger that burns there. “Personal matters. Marek was made a laughingstock when his daughter ran away. The only reason she wasn’t disowned there and then, and her son with her, was that she was is only child. And that her son was Sobieski’s legal heir. When she was killed- well, some saw it as the only right thing to do. An embarrassment was taken care of, the villain was punished, and the innocent child was given a stable home.”

Véa flushes and then turns pale; it is a good thing that she doesn’t have the same abilities as the dragons she serves, because if so, Yennefer knows that things would have become incendiary by this point.

“Triss,” Yennefer says. “I realise that this is decades-old gossip to you. But Véa is a…family friend to Aniela’s son. It’s personal to her as well.”

“Julian Sobieski?” Triss straightens, an excited gleam in her eyes. “You’re one of Julian Sobieski’s friends? Then he’s alive?”

“Julian Pankratz,” Véa corrects her stiffly. “And we are- acquainted.”

“The he’s alive,” Triss breathes. “No one is certain; the last anyone knows of him is that he ran away from Oxenfurt. His grandfather has been looking for him since.”

“Not one,” Yennefer says, her voice low and dangerous, “That you will be cashing in.”

Triss looks hurt, but Yennefer doesn’t back down. She well knows that Triss doesn’t need the money, but her friend might do it for the intrigue. For the thrill.

“Yenna,” Triss says. “I can’t believe that you would think that badly of me. I know how to keep a secret. I haven’t changed that much since Aretuza.”

Yennefer stares at her a moment more, danger and power crackling between them both. “No,” she says. “You haven’t. But you have to understand, Julian Pankratz is also under my protection. If anything were to happen to him, I would have to take revenge. On any who might be even tangentially related.”

“Peace,” Triss says, holding her hands up in surrender. “Here, Yenna; I swear on my Power that I won’t tell a soul that he’s still alive. There! Are you happy now?”

“Yes,” Yennefer says. And then she relaxes, the Chaos released from her grasp. “I am. Thank you Triss, you’ve been incredibly helpful.”

“You’re going already?” There’s a disappointed lilt to Triss’ tone; no doubt Yennefer’s visit is the most exciting thing to have happened in months.

“Yes,” Yennefer says, standing. “I have other matters to attend to.” She leans forward and kisses Triss’ cheek in farewell. The only reason that she doesn’t create a portal there and then- courtesy be damned- is that Véa still needs to reclaim her sword. “I’ll see myself out,” she says, and sweeps out the door with a dramatic twist of her dress, Véa following behind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there is very possible _TOO MUCH_ exposition in this one, but it just panned out like that! Also I can't believe that the murder mystery chapters are turning out more like a series of dates than anything else...


	8. Jaskier

“Jaskier!”

Geralt’s hands slow at Ciri’s voice, and Jaskier lifts his head up to glare at him. He’s sitting, lethargic, in Geralt’s lap and the Witcher’s hands with their sure movements down his spine are making him drowsy. That isn’t saying much, however; Jaskier has felt tired since he woke up, lead weighing down his limbs, and stealing all of his motivation.

Everyone has been tiptoeing around him all day, and were he less lethargic, he might be annoyed at them. Ok, yes, maybe he did have a _moment_ , and was a little overwhelmed by his emotions, and maybe he did cry himself to sleep-

But he maintains that crying oneself to sleep is just a Thing that happens every now and then, though perhaps not everyone admits to it. He’s certainly done so often enough, and not just when he was a child; there have been many a time throughout his life where- overwhelmed by the food, the cold, the pain, or even things as small as getting a stone in his boots- he’s sat down and had a good sob.

Hell, there have been times where he’s booked a separate room from Geralt specifically for that purpose; times where he knows that he’s overdue a slight break down. For which he absolutely cannot be judged for as he spends- spent- the majority of his time _fighting monsters_ , or watching someone he loves fight monsters which might actually be worse. No, upon reflection that is definitely worse than being the one in the actual fight. Geralt always gets panicky and over-solicitous whenever he smells Jaskier’s tears, and separate rooms solve that problem.

That, of course, doesn’t work when they’re literally living together.

Geralt is pretty subtle about it, to be fair; merely finding him after breakfast and offering to polish his scales. But Jaskier knows what he’s doing- knows that the soft touches and the pulsing reassurance and warmth are less that his scales are getting dull- though they are, and he’s got no idea why they’re looking this ragged, but that’s a thought for another time- and more because Geralt _cares_. Well, that and the fact that a twenty-minute process extends into forty minutes, then an hour, then an hour and half.

Two hours in, and the cloth that Geralt had been using has been abandoned, and he’s just rubbing absent-minded circles in the one spot between his wings. And all the while Geralt keeps up a soft commentary; narrating where he’s going next, to begin with, but as the minutes tick by he starts talking about his carvings, the wood that he’s been using, the techniques that he’s been learning, and the mistakes that he’s made so far. And when he runs out of words there, he starts talking about his potions, the delicate balance of ingredients that straddle the line between useful and actively poisonous, even to Witchers. And through it all, Jaskier just lies, curled on Geralt’s lap, eyes closed and listening. It’s strange, Geralt being the one filling the silence, but it isn’t unpleasant. It’s the opposite.

Borch has taken Ciri and Saskia out for the day- probably to practice some more flying- and Yennefer and Véa had left before Jaskier woke up. Téa is the only person there apart from them, and she’s been down in the lower caverns taking stock of their supplies all morning.

Jaskier thinks it’s pretty damn suspicious that Téa has chosen this exact day and time to do so, when she’s been keeping a pretty good eye on everything from the beginning, but he’s not going to complain. He’s just enjoying the time spent with _his_ Witcher, something that, a few months ago, he thought would never happen again.

“Jaskier!” comes the call again, and Geralt laughs.

“You’re being called for,” he says. His voice is slightly hoarse- Jaskier imagines that he’s done more talking in the past few hours than he has in the past month, or even year- but it’s soft and fond, and Jaskier hums in acknowledgement.

“Jaskier!” Ciri says a third time, running toward them both. She’s still got her travelling cloak on- a gift from her grandmother from the last time she made her weekly check-in- and it streams behind her like a banner.

_Ciri_ , Jaskier says, giving in to the inevitable and sitting up properly. _What is it?_

“You have to come with me,” Ciri says. “You and Geralt. It’s important!”

Jaskier can feel Geralt’s attention narrow, his mind focusing. He’s no doubt sweeping the cavern, making sure that there aren’t any unexplained fires, soldiers, monsters of any kind, or unknown mages. Jaskier sends him tired amusement at his paranoia; he has cause, of course- as the man who's been kidnapped upward of three times in the past year, he can’t deny that. It is still hilarious though; what does he think can breach these caves? Which are inaccessible to anyone who can’t fly, their already formidable magical defences augmented even further by Yennefer.

_Is it an emergency?_ Jaskier asks.

Ciri nods, her face incredibly serious apart from the smile that she keeps bursting out no matter how hard she tries to suppress it.

“It’s a huge emergency,” she says. “And we need both of you.”

“Well,” Geralt says, getting up and letting Jaskier curl around his neck. “If it’s an emergency-”

“It is!” And then Ciri is running back the way she came, glancing back periodically to make sure that they’re following her. Geralt follows at a more sedate pace, but the cavern isn’t _that_ large. It’s only ten minutes or so before they’re stepping into the outer caves where Ciri is waiting, practically vibrating in her excitement and impatience.

And Jaskier blinks. Because she’s standing next to the largest collection of pillows and bedrolls and blankets that he’s seen in his _life,_ all of them piled neatly onto a large square of fabric _._ Which is saying something. Saskia is perched on top of the mound, looking very smug.

_What is this?_ he asks.

“Borch helped me!” Ciri says, and Jaskier looks over at his father who’s looking incredibly long-suffering and who has a large net filled with even more pillows attached to his left side. Presumable the ones that haven’t yet been unloaded.

“Téa says that there are even more pillows in the downstairs caverns, and that she’d look for them for me, but I didn’t know if we had enough, so I asked Borch if we could get some more and we did! And it took us a few flights to get them all back, but we did! And I _still_ don’t think we have enough pillows, but Borch said that we should see how these do first and that we can get more tomorrow if there aren’t enough-”

_But what are they for?_ Jaskier asks, feeling as if he’d slipped into some parallel realm without noticing. There are enough soft furnishings here to outfit ten bordellos _at least_ , though that is perhaps not an observation that he’ll be sharing with anyone else.

Ciri _beams._ “You were sad,” she says. “And whenever I’m sad at home, Eist and grandmother and Mousesack help me make a pillow fort! Only, here are a lot more people, and also dragons, so we’re going to need to make a much bigger one.”

Jaskier blinks. Looks at the pillows. Looks at Ciri and the huge smile on her face. Looks back at the pillows. Looks at his father helplessly.

“You can see,” Borch says gravely. “Why we need your help in this important matter.”

“Hmm,” Geralt says, and he’s laughing, the bastard. Jaskier can feel his amusement curling though him.

_Well,_ Jaskier says. _Why not?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is going to be a pillow fort of truly epic proportions. though it might need to be stabilised by magic. 
> 
> Yennefer: ???  
> Ciri: It's a practical application of the geometry we're doing!


	9. Yennefer

Yennefer steps through the portal and into what looks like a battleground. Pillows litter the ground like corpses, innards wide open and gaping, fluffy down and goose feathers and horsehair floating spilled all over the ground.

In one corner of the cavern, Yennefer can see the bright glint of Jaskier’s scales from where he’s sitting in one of the tall pine trees, holding the edge of a large piece of canvas in his claws. The other side of the canvas is attached to one of the cavern walls- Yennefer suspects that Geralt must have had a hand in that- and slopes down until it reaches the floor, where it is being hammered in place by Ciri and Geralt.

Letting her gaze drift to the right, she can see Saskia trotting along with a pillow clasped in her mouth- which explains the mutilated pillows that are literally _everywhere_ \- with Borch and Téa next to her, each of them carrying their own pile of bedding far more successfully.

“I see that Ciri was successful,” Yennefer says, trying not to smile. The girl had cornered her after dinner the night before and demanded that in lieu of her lessons the next day she be allowed to design a blanket fort. One that, and Yennefer can still see Ciri’s wide green eyes staring up at her in supplication, wouldn’t collapse immediately. Because, Ciri had continued, though it’s fun sometimes when that happens, she wanted to make something that would _last_ so that they could sleep in it together.

“I never thought otherwise,” Véa replies. “She is very determined. And convinced that she can do anything.”

“After being raised by the Lioness of Cintra, I don’t doubt it.”

Ciri spots them at that moment and brightens, jumping up- narrowly avoiding hitting Geralt’s head with the stone she’s using to hammer in the wooden pegs they’re using to secure the cloth- and waving at them to come over.

“Yennefer! Véa!” she shouts at them, hands cupped around her mouth and a touch of magic augmenting her voice. “You’re back!” She jumps up and down in her excitement, and Geralt once again has to lean back to avoid getting a rock to the head.

Ciri starts to run toward them, but trips on one of the pillows strewn around her. Geralt immediately jerks forward, grunting as Ciri’s stone lands on his shoulder, and manages to catch her before she does much more than tip over. That does, however, put the two of them off balance and they fall straight into the canvas. Which buckles under the extra weight. The side attached to the cave wall holds fast, but Jaskier isn’t strong enough to keep his own grip and it’s torn out his grasp. He gives a little squeak and a flap of his wings to avoid falling out of the tree but overbalanced and falls forward, snapping out his wings to try and slow his descent.

Jaskier succeeds, but he also gets caught in the canvas- which wraps around him like a swaddling cloth- and then barrels straight into Ciri and Geralt, all three of them collapsing back onto the floor. Luckily, Geralt appears to have landed on the bottom.

The whole affair only takes a few seconds, which means that Yennefer can do nothing but watch it unfold. It’s a good thing that all those pillows had already been stacked underneath the pillows, though Geralt has dealt with far worse injuries than just _falling over._

“How is it,” Yennefer asks. “That you and I have travelled vast miles by magic in search of information on a murderer powerful enough to kill a dragon while those three have spent all day safe in this cave, yet they’re the ones getting injured?”

Véa snorts. “Talent,” she says.

#

Geralt’s only injury is a bruised rib, and that will fade and heal in less than a day. Nonetheless, she finds herself applying a healing salve to the injury much to her own- and Geralt’s- bemusement. Both Ciri and Jaskier’s pleading eyes and guilty looks are a formidable combination.

Still, despite the (unnecessary) medical treatment and his own innate Witcher healing, Geralt is summarily banished from helping in any of the actual construction. Instead he’s sent to carry pillows and blankets back and forth with Borch and Saskia. Personally, Yennefer thinks that’s more dangerous to his health than any amount of blunt force that Ciri could wield, but she’s not going to say anything. Of course, that also means that Jaskier’s useless as he’s too busy watching over his sister to make sure she doesn’t try anything.

Instead, Yennefer steps up.

“Show me your plans,” she says to Ciri, who has lost none of her enthusiasm despite her first attempt literally collapsing in front of her.

“I thought we could attach one side of the canvas to a tree and the other to the wall,” Ciri says. “And then weigh down the other side on the ground. That way there’s enough room for everyone.”

“Space won’t be a problem,” Yennefer says, looking at the designs that Ciri had handed her. “This is a good attempt,” she continues. “But it would be better if you secured a rope between the tree and the cave wall, or even two trees. Then we can secure the canvas over it and hammer it down on both sides so it will be less likely to collapse.” Honestly, this is rudimentary to anyone who’s camped in the wild before, and while Yennefer wouldn’t expect Ciri to know anything about it, one of the others should have said something. Perhaps they had just been swept up in the moment; it is incredibly hard to say no to Ciri.

“Oh,” Ciri says. “So- I did the design wrong?”

“You did what you could with the materials that were available to you,” Yennefer says. “And now we’re going to do it again. Just the two of us.”

Ciri groans. “But that’s going to take ages! And I wanted us all to sleep in it his evening.”

“Oh?” Yennefer says. “And here I thought you were eager to try out some more magic. Such a pity. Well, with Véa and Borch, I’m sure that I can get something sorted-”

“No, wait!”

Yennefer smirks. “Yes, Cirilla?” she asks.

“I can do actual magic?” There’s a hopeful lilt to the girl’s voice. It’s true that they’ve been focusing more on magical theory and the occasional rudimentary exercise, but Yennefer wants to make sure that she doesn’t burn herself out. She does also remember being young and frustrated at her teachers, and while she doesn’t think that Ciri should be catching _lightning_ there’s no harm in a few more spells.

“That depends,” Yennefer says, “on how well your levitation has progressed. Do you remember the incantation?”

“Yes!” Ciri says. “ _Zeilil eip._ ” She pronounces the words perfectly, the Elder fluid and accentless.

“Good, Ciri. Very good. Now, I’m going to lend you energy, and you? You’re going to build this pillow fort.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The spell here is from episode 2, the first spell that Yennefer did when levitating a rock. The Netflix subtitles were less than helpful when it came to figuring our what the incantation was (they just put (Elder speech) in brackets there), but luckily I found the conlang dialogue for Elder speech from David J. Peterson who worked on the show [here](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1575658). A huge thank you to David!


	10. Jaskier/Yennefer

Jaskier takes back all his reservations, pillow forts are _amazing._ He stretches out in pure bliss; everything is soft and warm and perfect. It’s like sleeping on a cloud. Only better, because he has flown through clouds, and has found them disappointingly wet.

“You look like you’re having fun,” Geralt says. He’s also lounging on the pillows, though frankly looking at the number of pillows he can’t do anything else. There is a waterproof tarp covering the floor, covered by a foundational layer of bedrolls that are then covered by pillows, two layers deep. Somehow they had managed to get _all_ the bedding into the fort, arranging it so that it’s truly nest-like, pillows propped up against the walls in complimentary shades. Jaskier already knew that Geralt had no part in choosing the pillows, but even if the Witcher hadn’t been with him all morning he would have been able to tell as they are in colours _other_ than black and covered in all sorts of superfluous tassels and ribbons.

Jaskier suspects magic is heavily involved in the construction of their fort; there’s truly no other way that everything would have fit. The fact that Borch had managed to fit in- though not stand up- is another indication that something not quite of the natural world was involved. Probably Yennefer had turned it into a teaching moment, though Ciri definitely hadn't minded; she’s been as excitable as a puppy all day, bouncing around and giving imperious orders. She’s currently collapsed in one corner and asleep, curled around Saskia, exhausted. One day she is going to be a very competent queen, and woe betide anyone who gets in her way.

_I am having a wonderful time,_ Jaskier says, and though the words are glib, and quite possibly aren’t being completely understood by Geralt, he underpins them with emotion.

The love and warmth in his heart at the fact that that his family- all his family, the family that he’s chosen for himself and the family that matters- have spent the day building something for _him_. Because he was sad. Oh, Ciri can dress it up however she likes, and Yennefer can sniff and mutter things about ‘practical applications’, but Jaskier knows that this, all of this work and expense (where did they get these many pillows? In the middle of winter?) is for him. Because they _care about him._

Geralt smiles back at him- a proper smile not one of those small, mocking ones that he gives lords who think they know more about monster hunting than a Witcher, and Jaskier thinks about how strange it is that in the here and now, unable to effectively communicate, it feels like they’re able to understand each other for the first time in a while. To look past closely held fears and misleading words, past the longing and the heartache and the false assumptions- on both their sides, Jaskier is coming to realise- to see that they _love_ each other.

They have a few hours before dinner. And Jaskier still hasn’t been given any homework, and Geralt hasn’t been drafted into hunting, or bartering, or whatever he and Borch do with the days. So the two of them, dragon and Witcher, spend a few more hours drowsing together.

#

“Yennefer,” Borch says, eyes and scales luminous in the darkness of cave. The firelight flickers, burnishing his gold scales red. “You said you needed to talk to me.”

“Yes,” Yennefer says. She leans against the wall, staring at the dragon. She’s not looking forward to this; her initial unease has had time to stew, to deepen, to develop. It’s not the same, of course it’s not. It’s practically the opposite; Jaskier wasn’t sold for a pittance. He was _wanted;_ wanted so desperately that a man had been willing to kill for him. And yet- both of them had been seen, not as a person, not as a child with all the faults and endearments and complexity that that entails, but as an object. As a means to an end.

Yennefer has come to appreciate the bard in the past few months.

That’s untrue. She’s always appreciated him, though admittedly the first time she’d met him it was an appreciation of how easy he way to scare. Valley of penis, indeed. Then, as their paths crossed over the next few years, it was an appreciation of his wit; crossing verbal swords had been an enjoyable distraction, not in the least because she came out on top more often than not. When she had been working on finding him, after Geralt had burst into her life again without so much as an apology, she had appreciated the puzzle that his disappearance had given her, and one that she had solved eventually. And one that, if he should go missing again- which she wouldn’t put past him- she would be able to complete much more quickly, having been fortunate enough to study the wards that protected Borch’s sanctuary.

And somewhere in all that appreciation he had managed to grow on her. Like a fungus. Feeling his panic at even the thought of returning to his childhood home had resonated with something in her, something that she thought had been extinguished in her long ago. If not during her time at Aretuza, then when she had learnt of her father’s death in those first heady years at the Aedirn court. She had toasted him, then. Dressed in her furs and silks, drunk on power and beauty and success, she had raised a glass of prohibitively expensive wine to his memory and laughed.

Later, much later, when she had realised the futility of her position, that she had sold herself into a lifetime of monotony, she had laughed again. It was a dark, bitter thing, and she had left court not long after.

Yennefer looks past Borch and at Véa, who is carefully laying loaves of unleavened bread on hot stones next to the fire while her cousin stirs the large iron pot. The others are in the fort, safe and protected and unlikely to hear the conversation.

“I met with an old friend today,” she says, her voice steady and her hands clenched so tightly that she can feel her nails dig into her palms. “Triss Merigold.”

“The Temerian Court Mage,” Borch says. “I know of her, though our paths have not crossed. A talented mage, by all accounts. Loyal.”

“And well-informed,” Yennefer replies. “She knows- well, she knows something of what happened, all those years ago in Lettenhove. Whether it’s the truth- who can say. But it’s important. Because Jaskier’s grandfather is still looking for him.”

She looks straight at Borch and sees reflected in his eyes her own worry.

“I think,” Borch says carefully. “You had better tell me everything.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I need you all to know that I opened my word document to upload this chapter and almost accidentally uploaded my lab report instead. A near miss...


	11. Jaskier

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: nightmares, blood, disturbing imagery, implied child abuse 
> 
> I am a problem and I can only apologise. If it helps, I made myself sad writing this.

_Jaskier hums absently, strumming his lute as he wanders through the corridors. They’re long and dark and dank, black mould growing in the cracks and crannies of the walls. It’s humid; his clothes stick to him unpleasantly, and he can taste the sea-salt-brine in the air, coating his tongue and throat. His clothes feel tight and unnatural on him; his doublet is fully buttoned, and it’s stifling. Like he can’t breathe. Still, he begins to sing, his voice high and pure and ringing out through the deserted corridors._

_He doesn’t know what he’s singing; the words are in a language he doesn’t recognise, and they pour out of him like a flood, barely letting him take a breath. His chest aches and he starts to wheeze, yet still he continues singing. Still his hands dance on his lute strings, the notes echoing in unearthly accompaniment. They ache, they burn, they cramp. But he doesn’t stop. He can’t stop._

_And he wanders._

_Eventually he comes to a ballroom, cavernous and ancient and filled with spiderwebs that glisten in the dark corners. Every step leaves deep footprints in the dust that lies on the marble floor. Around him, he can see rows of paintings, hanging on the walls and extending into the black. His fingers still on his lute strings and his voice finally quiets. He steps forward to peer at them, brushing off the cobwebs and dirt to reveal the lavish colours beneath._

_He sets his lute down on the floor and it is immediately covered by spiders who weave their silver web around it so quickly that in mere seconds it’s completely covered. It sinks through the floor before his eyes and he feels a pang of grief so strong that he almost cries._

_Trembling, he turns to look at the first painting. Bright gold, a king’s fortune, gilding almost every inch of the canvas. Dragons, golden dragons. And he shakes because- whatever portion of the painting isn’t gilded gold is **red.** Bright red, blood spurting. Rust red, painting the ground. There are knights, their own armour covered in the red blood of their fallen foes, faces twisted in a parody of a smile. And overseeing it all, safe in his high tower, a wizard. The only spot of darkness in the gaudy scenes, his robes black and simple, his face still and serene. In one hand he holds a book, and in the other-_

_In the other is a heart. Still dripping. He looks again at the wizard and realises that he knows that face. Because it’s his grandfather staring straight at him, blue painted eyes- Sobieski eyes, eyes that Jaskier shares- blank and lifeless and still staring into his soul. Cataloguing his faults._

_Jaskier stumbles back with a cry, covering his eyes, but the scene is burnt onto his retinas. And every moment more he can see more details. His sister’s small body, unnatural still and silent, almost buried beneath the pile of bodies. His father, wings tattered, mouth open in a howl of pain. And the heart, the heart, the heart that his grandfather is holding, the heart that is too small to be a dragon’s._

_“No,” he says. Screams. Cries. “No, you can’t do this to me. Not again, please, not again-”_

_The painted figure grows larger and larger until it’s filled the entire frame. And then it’s stepping out, book and heart discarded but hands still red with blood. Jaskier’s grandfather stares down at him and Jaskier is frozen in fear, his heart fluttering in his chest. Trapped like he is. Trapped, trapped, trapped. And suddenly Jaskier realises that he’s not in the ballroom or in the empty halls- no, he’s sat in his grandfather’s chair but he can’t move, and he looks down to see that fine gold chains are pinning him down so he can’t move, so he can’t escape, so he can’t even **breathe**._

_-not again, not again, no, please-_

“Jaskier!”

He wakes, heaving, crying, panicked. Fighting against the soft blankets that have been wrapped around him. There’s a voice, but he can’t hear it. He can’t hear anything but that awful music, can’t see anything but the slaughter painted before his eyes. A murmured word and then he’s free and he stretches his wings and launches himself out of the cloying softness, shivering in the cool night air.

“Julek,” a voice calls, and he turns to see Véa behind him, approaching slowly. To his left, he can see the tarp serving as door twitch, and Yennefer and Geralt exit. They are also moving slowly. Carefully.

“Jaskier,” Geralt says softly, and there is _warmthconcern_ that Jaskier latches onto desperately, still shaking. They don’t come any closer, and Jaskier glad, fiercely glad because he doesn’t know whether he can deal with their sympathy. With their pitying looks.

He’s old enough that it shouldn’t matter- it’s been long enough that it doesn’t make sense that just the mention of his grandfather- he shouldn’t be this weak; why is he breaking down _now-_

He closes his eyes, and when he opens them, he can’t help but give a keen of fear because his father is there. Borch is there, the gold of his scales dull in the faint moonlight, and the last time that Jaskier saw him, he was _dead,_ he was slaughtered, he had such a look of despair on his face-

“My son,” Borch says, kneeling down and leaning his head against Jaskier’s. It’s warm; Jaskier can feel the softness of his scales, the thrumming of his blood, the rasp of his breathe. Jaskier uses the sounds to anchor himself, to remind himself that this is the present. That this is the reality. That his family is safe. That he is safe, that he’s not going back. That no one can force him back.

Borch’s mind folds around his, protective and fierce and loving. And Jaskier knows. Knows that his father would die before letting anything happen to him. And somehow that thought isn’t as reassuring as it should be.

Jaskier takes a deep breath. Then another. And deliberately, he walks to where Yennefer and Geralt are still standing.

_Yennefer,_ he says, keeping his voice as steady as possible. _You said that you needed my blood?_

“Yes,” Yennefer says. There’s something terrible on her face, a hard set to her mouth that Jaskier hasn’t seen before. He isn’t afraid, though. Not of Yennefer. Not anymore.

_And you’ll find out what happened to my parents? And- and make sure that the danger is gone. That there’s no one and nothing else after me._ Or my family, he doesn’t day, but from the way that Yennefer looks at him, he doesn’t need to.

“I will.” Looking at Yennefer, tall and strong and stern in the moonlight, Jaskier doesn’t doubt her.

_Good,_ he says. _Then you can have my blood._

And then he turns- sending another grateful pulse at Geralt- and walks back to his father.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> People seem to be strangely interested in my lab report? So! It is on plant transformations, basically inserting a transgene into potatoes and tomatoes. I am definitely not going to upload it because I am afraid of it being flagged by Turnitin as plagiarism when I submit it, and that would be a very embarrassing conversations to have...
> 
> A huge thanks to ThebanSacredBand who pointed out that I had accidentally posted this chapter to Butter-cup of Tea, which is our fluffy round robin café AU. That could also have been a problem. oops.


	12. Yennefer

The amulet burns against Yennefer’s chest. Not literally, of course. Her magic is powerful enough that she even if it did produce heat then she would be able to shield herself from the exothermic effects.

The amulets aren’t anything special, or particularly hard. Not unless you take into account the fact that the key ingredient is Jaskier’s blood. Jaskier, who came up to her that morning with dull eyes and who had wordlessly extended his forearm so that she could take her blood.

It would have been easy to have taken more than the two drops needed; someone really needs to speak to Jaskier about his propensity to do foolhardy things. Dragon’s blood- of any species- is expensive, rare, and something that most mages will kill for. They do kill for, because a dragon is a wealth of alchemical ingredients, but the _heart_. A dragon’s heart used correctly can work miracles. The sacrifice of such an inherently magical creature- well, it’s enough to negate the price for spells that would otherwise be impossible. A year ago, on that wretched dragon hunt, Yennefer had counted on a dragon’s heart for her own miracle. Now the thought of it makes her sick to her stomach.

Borch had stood over her, a silent threat, as she had collected the blood, carefully placing a drop each onto the amulets that she had prepared. She hadn’t had enough time to buy anything, or to collect them from her home, so she had contented herself with a single gold coin that she had split in half, boring a hole into each piece and threading them with a leather thong. Perhaps it would have been easier to use two separate coins, but there was something that had whispered to her that using two halves of a whole was _right._ And it was cheaper, of course.

It was a simple enough spell and the magic coursing through Jaskier’s blood had been enough to pay Chaos’ price; as she had spoken the incantation the gold of the coins had tarnished and darkened until they were a deep red. The colour of Jaskier’s stone, in fact, and she had frowned, tucking that fact into the corner of her mind to pursue later.

Perhaps it’s something inherent to Jaskier himself that makes the amulet burn. Something intrinsically linked to the fear still coursing through his mind. The echoes of which she can feel even now.

She and Véa and in Lettenhove, waiting until night falls to enter into the Sobieski estate and spending the time attempting to find someone who might know more information about the murders. Even if she hadn’t seen Jaskier that morning, seen Borch’s protective stance that speaks of an unwillingness to let his son out of his sight for at least a decade, then he would never have returned to Lettenhove. That much has been made clear to her over the past few days. Then why can she feel faint traces of his mind wherever she goes? To the point where she will stop and strain and try to see him, because it feels like he’s behind her. Next to her.

She feels it when she’s talking to the old flower seller near the docks, who doesn’t know anything but recounts gruesome conspiracy theories for a good ten minutes before handing her a small daisy- transported from warmer Southern climes- and thanking her for her attention. Yennefer hands it to Véa as they leave, smiling slightly as the warrior tucks it securely into her belt.

She feels it when they wander the grey streets, Véa guiding her as she closes her eyes and searches for any hint of magic. She turns so quickly at the hint of Jaskier’s presence that she almost walks straight into one of the many foul-smelling puddles, only Véa quick reflexes saving her from a humiliating bath. 

She feels it when they step into what looks like the town’s only decent inn- that is to say one that serves food that isn’t as grey and tasteless as the omnipresent mist- and the owner, clearly intimidated by her dress and her manner and the aura of power that she’s worked hard to cultivate comes to talk to her. She brushes it off, though, banishes it to the back of her mind because the innkeeper- Dorota- starts talking, and she might be the first person of use in this small, sad town.

“He came in here,” Dorota says, her voice low and cracked. “The young mistress’ lover. That’s who you’re asking about, isn’t it?” She smiles at them both, baring her cracked and yellowed teeth. Yennefer smiles back, fierce and unperturbed. She recognises a power play when she sees one.

“I’m looking for information on Aniela Sobieska’s death,” Yennefer says. She’s been casting small magics all day to obscure and confuse the memories of those that she and Véa talk to, but there’s no harm in being cautious.

Dorota hums at her. “Aniela Pankratzowa, I think you’ll find,” she says, and from the tone of her voice she believes that she’s won. Which she has, curse her, because no one in Lettenhove has heard of the name Pankratz. Or none are willing to admit it. Jaskier is referred to as Julian Sobieski- if he’s talked about at all- and his mother as Aniela Sobieska, with no reference to her husband, or that she married in the first place. Yennefer feels a begrudging respect for Jaskier, who must have found his father’s name, somehow, and clung tightly to it.

Yennefer sits carefully at one of the rickety tables, barely avoiding a dozen splinters and probably tetanus to boot. Véa sits next to her, her solid presence comforting.

“What do you know?” she asks, lowering her voice so that Dorota is forced to lean forward to hear her. 

“About their deaths?”

“About anything you can tell us,” Véa says, placing a casual hand on one of her swords. Her glower, to Yennefer’s eye, if far more impressive than even Geralt’s. To sweeten the pot, Yennefer reaches into her coin pouch and takes out twenty crowns. She stacks them in front of her, where they shine brightly in the dim light. Dorata reaches forward to take them, turning them over and over in her frail hands. Judging by the state of the inn, they’re more money than she has seen in a while. 

“It’ll do,” Dorata says. “It’ll do. For now. I’ll expect twenty more when I’ve finished my story.” She cackles as she counts out the coins, and Yennefer feels a sharp pang of annoyance at the amount of stereotypes the woman is upholding.

“You think that your story is worth forty crowns?” Yennefer asks. Forty crowns are a small fortune for these parts, enough to buy a fine silk shawl or enough rations to last a week.

“I know it is,” Dorata replies, and she’s not smiling anymore. “Listen closely, witch,” she says. “Listen to the story of Aniela Sobieska. And of Jacek Pankratz.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Additional notes (in no particular order):  
> -The English equivalent to Jacek (Jaskier's dad's name) is Hyacinth. I enjoy the thought that he also had a flower name. 
> 
> -The Sobieski family is a real noble Polish house, prominent in the 16th and 17th centuries. Marek Sobieski, whose name I stole for Jaskier’s grandfather, was King Jan III Sobieski’s grandfather, and bears no resemblance whatsoever to my character.  
> The -ski at the end of a Polish surname was originally the name of nobility and indicated where the family was from. 
> 
> -I did a bit of research into Polish family names, and I think technically that as an unmarried woman Aniela’s surname should be something like Sobieskowna around this time period, but I took the modern Sobieska instead because I liked the way it sounded better. Pankratzowa I believe is the archaic feminine surname that indicates the person to whom it belongs is married to a person whose last name is Pankratz.
> 
> -The -owna and -owa suffixes are archaic uses: I believe that modern day feminine forms of surnames are either adding an -a at the end for names that end in a vowel (or a y) or remain unchanged for names that end in a consonant. I am not Polish, so please don’t hesitate to correct me if I’m wrong.


	13. Jaskier

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the late update! I finished writing my lab report last night, and then didn't have the time/mental bandwidth to write today's chapter, so I've been doing it this morning/afternoon instead.

_Close your eyes, Julian._

Borch’s voice echoes through his head, and Jaskier takes a deep breath, concentrating the words. And the underlying sentiments. And trying not to think of the fact that he’s sat in the hollow of his father’s back, where his wings meet his body, and about to leave the safety of the cave for the first time in weeks.

He shifts uneasily, curling more tightly around himself. His eyes are shut but he can still feel the wind on his back, making him shiver in something that he’s pretty sure isn’t cold. It isn’t _fear_ either he’s just- he’s just nervous. That’s all. And he has a right to be!

_Are you sure-_

_Yes,_ Jaskier replies, quickly. So quickly that he cuts his father off. Which is possibly a little rude, but really, Borch doesn’t seem to mind, and he’s spent his life somewhere on the spectrum between ‘a little rude’ and ‘a right bastard’. He’s not going to change now. And he likes to think that no one would want him to change. Or expect him to. Or think less of him because of it. He’s seen Geralt laugh at his little jibes; he finds them amusing. He does! Though possibly not that amusing when they’re being kicked out of yet another inn because of his slightly-too-loud critique of the food. Or when they’re being driven out of town because he was a little mouthy to one of the muttonheads who masquerade as Aldermen.

There’s a swooping feeling in his stomach, and then they’re off. Flying. Outside of the wards and protections. Jaskier covers his face with his wings. In a way, it’s a good thing that he’s- _apprehensive_ \- about flying outside, because otherwise he might have just thrown himself off Borch’s back and flown back home. And then all his progress will be lost, and he’ll have to stay in that cave for the rest of his life.

(And yet, even when he’s not the one doing the flying, even when he’s only perched on his father’s back, he can’t help but feel that joy. The joy of freedom and flying.)

It’s a nice cave. It’s a really nice cave, and he’s pretty sure that magic must have been involved in its creation. Magic or some sort of decades-long renovation project, because there’s no way that a cave like that just occurs naturally, in such a perfectly inaccessible location. It is not, however, a cave that he wants to be stuck in for the rest of his life. He’s a wanderer; forced to stay in one place for too long, his feet (wings?) start itching and he’s gone before his host can utter the words ‘permanent address’.

Not that he’s opposed to having somewhere less temporary! Somewhere that he can return to, year after year, in the sure and certain knowledge that there’ll be a place for him. That it will welcome him back. That there’ll be warmth and love; that there’s no expected payment needed. No court to entertain, no expectations pressing down on him until he’s crushed under their weight, nothing needed from him except for his own presence. No, the thought of being able to return to such a sanctuary is one of the reasons that he’s doing his whole ‘confronting his fears’ things in the first place; after all, if he’s to have a place to return to, he has to actually _leave_ in the first place.

It’s- not the only reason.

Because- yes, Geralt is here. And he’s staying for the winter, at least. But he’s a Witcher, a man of action. And Jaskier knows that even if he is enjoying this interlude, that he’ll never be the kind to settle down, become housebound. Jaskier would never cage his Witcher. _Never._ This winter- well, Jaskier figures that it isn’t dissimilar to the winters that Geralt spends at Kaer Morhen. And Jaskier knows that after every winter he leaves and continues on his Path. And Jaskier wants to accompany him on that Path. When the time comes. Which means that he has to be able to be a human, yes, but most importantly it means that he has to be able to _travel._

And Geralt’s not the only one. When Ciri’s year of being fostered has ended and she returns to Cintra, then unless he gets over himself then he’ll never be able to see her again. Unless she comes to visit him, which is a lot to ask of someone who’s preparing to become Queen. No doubt Yennefer will leave once Ciri does and her obligations are over. And Jaskier will miss her and isn’t that just a kicker. Missing Yennefer of Vengerberg! She’d laugh if he told her that, and he wouldn’t blame her. But he would.

Saskia and Borch will stay with him. And Véa and Téa will stay with Borch. (Maybe. Depending on whether the fleeting glances and soft touches that Jaskier’s caught between Véa and Yennefer have coalesced into anything by the time the sorceress leaves.) He can take comfort in that, at least.

It’s only been a few minutes- surely not more than ten?- when Jaskier feels Borch land. He doesn’t know where they are- surely not back at the cave. It doesn’t smell right to be the cave; no woodsmoke, no people. There is the sound of water, but it’s calmer than the waterfalls. And there’s a smell- a perfumed smell. But that can’t be right, because it’s the middle of winter. Ish. The concept of winter is hazy when the place they’re living has snow from October to May. In any case, not a conducive climate to growing flowers.

_Open your eyes,_ Borch says, and Jaskier can feel the anticipation behind his words. The anticipation, and a sense of _pride._

Jaskier does so and _stares._ Because he was wrong. He was so very wrong. There are flowers _everywhere_ ; white and pink, surrounded by tall grasses and swaying gently in the wind. They are concentrated around a bubbling water source- steaming in the cool air- and follow the water’s meandering path down through small valley that Borch had landed in.

_A hot spring,_ Borch says. _There are flowers all year long, nurtured by the heat of the water. It’s easily accessible in the warmer months, once the snow has melted. But now? Now the only way to access it is by air._

Jaskier doesn’t say anything. He just jumps from Borch’s back and glides down until he’s reached the ground. Tentatively, he nudges one of the flowers with his nose, checking to see that it’s real. The pollen tickles his nose and he sneezes. Yes, that’s real.

_Oh,_ he says. _It’s beautiful._

And it _is,_ peaceful and serene and probably about a month’s journey by foot. Nothing that he would have been able to find on his own.

_I found it years ago, when I first came to these mountains. It’s been a source of comfort to me; knowing that there’s still life and warmth in the world even on the darkest and coldest of days._

Borch walks over to join Jaskier, standing next to him and looking over the valley.

_It’s not far from the cave,_ he says. _And I thought you might like to spend some time here._

Jaskier swallows. _Yes,_ he says. _I think I would like that._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's an interesting paper on flowering plants that are able to tolerate the heat of geothermal areas [here](https://academic.oup.com/aob/article/90/2/259/289045#3653095) by Stout and Al-Niemi (2002) that I used as a brief reference to the flowers that are in the valley. It's not quite the same as they're looking at flowers that are present at degrees of >40°C; but similar enough?? Table 2 is a good place to look if you want to see the species!


	14. Yennefer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, you have all been so amazing! It is now 2 weeks since I started this (I also can't believe it) and you've kept reading and leaving kudos and leaving comments, and I am just so grateful ❤️❤️
> 
> This chapter is late and I am so sorry. I've had a load of coursework and exams coming up, and I've been having a Time 😅 But it's here! woohoo!

“Mikolaj!” Dorata calls, not looking away from her audience. “Drinks. Now.”

A boy, no older than fifteen or sixteen- though Yennefer admits that ages tend to blur together in boys that young- hurries forward, carrying a demijohn filled with a clear liquid and three wooden cups. The woman’s grandson, Yennefer guesses. There’s something in the shape of his jaw and the tilt of his head.

“Leave the bottle, Mikolaj,” Dorata says as the boy turns to leave. He hesitates, about to say something, but she shoots him a look. He leaves the bottle.

“Drinks,” Yennefer says. “Really? I thought that you were eager to tell this story. Not while away our precious time on day drinking.” Yennefer isn’t a stranger to spending the occasional day- or week- in a state of blissful intoxication, but she’s also a sorceress and able to mitigate the worst effects. If this is the other woman’s chief pastime, then it’s no wonder that she looks as haggard as she does.

“Believe me,” Dorata says, picking up one of the cups and knocking it back with the ease of long practise. “You’re going to want it.”

Yennefer sniffs disdainfully, but goes to pick up her own cup, swirling the liquid inside and muttering a spell under her breath. It looks like cheap vodka, but one can never be too careful. Especially when the person serving the drinks is being suspiciously helpful. She moves to take a sip, but Véa’s hand on her arm stops her.

“I will drink it first,” Véa says. She doesn’t bother to keep her voice low, just takes the cup and takes a cautious sip. From the grimace on her face, Yennefer’s guess about the quality of the drink was correct.

“It’s not poisoned,” Dorata says, but she sounds amused rather than offended. “Though I commend your paranoia. You’re going to need that, if you intend to go against the Lord.”

Yennefer is not a patient woman. “Stop wasting our time,” she snaps. “And tell us the gods-bedamned story.”

Dorata cackles again and Yennefer represses to urge to turn her into something small and slimy. She’s certain that Véa would keep the secret if she asked, and even if she didn’t then the only person who’d have a real problem with it would be Geralt. And fuck what Geralt thinks.

“Patience, sorceress,” Dorata says, reaching out to pour herself more vodka. There must be some visual indication of just how close Yennefer is to snapping present on her face, though, because she takes a single sip, and then starts to talk.

“When I was a girl, I would sit in this very room and I would stare at the patrons. Back then Lettenhove was _important_ and this inn was the most popular tavern in the city. I would sit and stare for hours watching the patrons laugh, and tell lewd stories, and drink their own weight in vodka. However busy we were, my father would always make sure that the back table was free. I saw him refuse down merchants, their purses stuffed with gold pieces; pirates, waving daggers and sword with more enthusiasm than skill; sailors who were twice his height and had muscles the size of my head.

He would never give that back table away, and if any foreigner took trouble with that- and it was always the foreigners- then they quickly learnt that the people of Lettenhove would come to his aid. Because that table- that table belonged to Jacek Pankratz. And he was _ours._

Nobody know what he was. Oh, everyone had a different tale; that he was an elven prince, or one of the old gods descended to the mortal plane and never gone back, or a powerful sorcerer. All we knew was that he had lived in Lettenhove since our parent’s parent’s time, and that as much as he was _ours_ we were also _his._ When we walked the streets at night, safe in the knowledge that we were from _Lettenhove_ , when our fishermen came back safely day after day with nets full of fish, when the storms raged wild and untamed on the horizon yet never seemed to hit our city… We knew that it was because of him. Jacek Pankratz.

And we took care of him. Made sure that he was fed and watered and had a place to lay his head every night. He was a wanderer, you see. Carrying nothing but that little notebook of his that he would scribble into as he walked. It became a game, amongst us children; who could pull him out of the way of a speeding carriage in time, who could stop him before he walked into the pier. Again. It wasn’t altruistic, of course; we were well paid by the pieces of candied ginger that he would slip us whenever he saw us.”

“While this is nice,” Yennefer says- and it is because at least she has proof that Jaskier’s air-headedness is genetic-, “Perhaps you could get to the relevant section? About his murder?”

Dorata scowls at her. “’Anything you can tell us’ is what you asked for,” she says.

“I didn’t realise that would lead to an extended reminiscence into your childhood,” Yennefer replies. She glances outside- the sun is low in the sky. There’s not much time left before nightfall.

“Fine,” Dorata hisses. “Then I’ll tell you about his downfall. And the day that he met Aniela Sobieska. I was nineteen at the time and being courted by my Piotr. His father was a fisherman, but he was ambitious.” She smiles, eyes softening in fond remembrance, and for just a moment Yennefer can see the beauty that she must have been.

“My Piotrek worked at the Lord’s house as a stable hand. He was good with horses and everyone could see it. He was being groomed to take over as stablemaster when Old Andrzej retired, and we all knew it. So, he was the one who was sent to accompany Lady Aniela when she decided to go on her rides in the woods.

There’d been talk of wolves in the woods that spring. Lettenhove had been prosperous for decades at that point, and the Sobieki family had profited from its success. This meant more parties, more feasts, more decadence. Which in turn meant that the forest had been steadily depleted of animals over the years. The wolves were starving and were forced closer and closer to civilisation. Not that the Lord would listen to us, when we told him.”

Dorata’s eyes turn bitter, and she spits on the ground.

“Jacek was there in the woods. We’d begged him to intervene; Lettenhove was safe, but many of us had friends and family who couldn’t afford to live in the city, and we were afraid. People were dying, and he was the only one who could help.

It was in those woods that they met. Our protector and the Lord’s daughter. And that was the beginning of the end.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yennefer and Véa: Want a simple answer to their question about wtf is going on  
> Dorata: Starts monologuing about her childhood  
> Yennefer and Véa: ...


	15. Jaskier

_No,_ Jaskier says, tilting his head. _I don’t think it’s that lopsided. In fact, I think it’s perfect._

Ciri beams at him, her own flower crown balanced precariously on her head. It’s a tidy circle of grass and white flowers that Téa, who as it turns out is surprisingly good with her hands, had made. And even better at avoiding Saskia, who has taken the twitching of the wreaths as an invitation to shred them to pieces. His sister is a bloodthirsty little hellion, but is equally incredibly cute, so Jaskier can’t hold it against her. And she has a generous heart: she doesn’t keep the flowers that she has savaged, no. Instead she presents them to her family with the solemnity of a liege-lord presenting his tribute to his monarch.

Borch and Jaskier accept her gifts with equal solemnity, which means that the both of them are now surrounded by a small pile of white petals from all the murdered flowers. Luckily for the local flora, Saskia has tired herself out quickly enough, and is now fast asleep on her father’s back, stretched out in the remains of her triumphs.

Free of her tyranny, Ciri has been able to construct slightly messier but still perfectly adequate garlands of her own, which she’s woven around Jaskier’s horns and Saskia’s neck. None of them are concentrating on that, however. No, it’s Ciri’s next project that has caught their attention. Geralt of Rivia, hair covered in thousand- hundreds- dozens- ok, only like ten plaits studded with white flowers at irregular intervals. 

Geralt does long-suffering so well; it must be a talent.

_I sincerely think that you’ve got the balance between the two sides perfect,_ Jaskier continues, taking a few steps back to better take in the vision before him. _But there’s never any harm in adding a few more flowers-_

Ciri bursts into laughter, and Geralt narrows his eyes at Jaskier.

“I don’t know exactly what you’re saying,” he growls, his already deep voice dropping several octaves. Jaskier is impressed- how does Geralt manage to do that, exactly, without his throat getting terribly sore the next day? Perhaps that’s the secret behind his laconic nature; not due to any of that ‘Witcher’s don’t have emotions’ bullshit, or the his inherently stoic nature, but perhaps instead because he enjoys a bit of melodrama and keeps giving himself a sore throat pursuing that urge. Well, Jaskier isn’t one to judge if that’s the case; the number of injuries that he’s incurred from jumping on tables, or off tables, or dancing down a heavily laden table… actually, maybe it’s not the drama that’s the problem, but tables…

There’s a pulse of fondness, and Jaskier looks up at Geralt.

“I’m trying to threaten you, Jaskier,” the Witcher says. “If you could do me the courtesy of listening?”

Jaskier snorts, because Geralt is in no way threatening him. Sure, he’s lowered his voice, and narrowed his eyes, and there’s a scowl on his face… But Jaskier can feel the amusement radiating from him and can see the tightness at the sides of his scowl where Geralt is trying to suppress the smile from breaking out.

_I don’t believe you,_ he replies primly. _In fact-_

He looks over at Ciri, who’s still got flowers scattered around her. She looks back at him, and he can see the same impulse in her own eyes. So he looks back at Geralt and layers careful innocence around his mind, quietening his thoughts. Geralt narrows his eyes.

“Jaskier, wait-” he starts.

For nothing, because at that moment Jaskier and Ciri leap at him and he goes down in a pile of flailing limbs. Jaskier gets an elbow in the face, but he’s fairly certain that it’s one of Ciri’s, so he perseveres, tangling himself around Geralt until he can’t help but fall over under their combined efforts.

“Help would be appreciated,” the Witcher grunts, looking over at the other ostensible ‘adults.’

A few meters away, Téa snorts at the sight, but doesn’t stop her own project, which appears to be making a large enough wreath for Borch. Borch himself opens one lazy eye and shrugs.

“Unfortunately,” the dragon says, his tone indicating that it is anything but. “I have my own burdens to bear. I wish you the best of luck, though, Geralt.”

_Quick!_ Jaskier says, climbing up to sit on Geralt’s back and delighting in the feel of bunching muscles as the Witcher tries (and fails) to repress his laughter. _While I’ve got him pinned!_

Ciri doesn’t hesitate, diving in with her spare flowers and plaiting as quickly as possible, her small hands flying. The resulting plaits are messy but functional, flowers falling everywhere as Geralt growls at them both. Jaskier digs his claws into his chest and radiates smugness at him, and Geralt lets his head fall back with a chuff of laughter.

“You can’t keep me here forever,” Geralt says. “Sooner or later you’ll get hungry, and then it will be my turn to strike back.”

_On the contrary,_ Jaskier replies, making himself more comfortable on the Witcher’s back. _Ciri is the finest of accomplices, and will make sure that I’m well fed. Won’t you, Ciri?_

Ciri lets out her own ‘hmm’ of consideration, and Jaskier gasps at the betrayal.

“I don’t know,” she says, doing an eerily good impression of Geralt. “You do eat a lot, Jaskier, and if you’re trapped there then that means more food for me…”

_How dare you!_ Jaskier cries, sitting up. Geralt gives a muffled _oof_ at the change in posture but doesn’t make any move to escape. _I’ll have you know that it takes energy to keep looking this good. In any case, don’t think I don’t know about the pastries that your grandmother sends you back with-_

“Jaskier!” Ciri says. “You said that you’d keep that a secret!”

Jaskier almost apologises when he sees the devastation on her face but stops himself just in time. Because there’s a wicked grin spreading across her face, making her look a lot like her grandmother. Ciri, Jaskier reflects, has had many role models over her short life, all of them terrifying.

“If you feel that way,” she continues, “I suppose that means that our truce is over…”

And then Geralt is surging up from underneath him, turning to catch Jaskier before he can tactically retreat back to safety.

“What should we do with him, princess?” Geralt asks, affecting a low, courtly bow that Jaskier knows went out of fashion at least two decades ago.

Ciri draws herself up to her full height.

“Toss him in the water!” she decrees, gesturing at the hot spring.

“As my princess commands,” Geralt says, with another bow.

_Wait, no, stop-!_ Jaskier squirms in the Witcher’s grip but can’t manage to free himself. _You don’t want to do this- my sister will wreak terrible vengeance upon you-!_

“Such a pity,” Geralt says placidly. “That I can’t understand what you’re saying, Jaskier.”

_You brute, I know you know what I’m getting at-!_

And then Geralt tips him out of his arms, and Jaskier is too busy spluttering in the shallow water to make his retort. He comes up after a moment, petals plastered to his head and wreath drooping over one eye.

_You’ll regret that,_ he swears, and then launches himself out of the water, still dripping wet, and shakes- spraying water droplets all over Ciri and Geralt, to the sound of her delighted shrieks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, the joys of the established story format maintaining the tension! 😇
> 
> Brought to you late courtesy of stupid scientific posters. Brought to you at all thanks to procrastinating on making stupid scientific posters. I might have to give up on posting chapters at a certain time.


	16. Piotr

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a different type of chapter from normal; rest assured, the fact that it's in the past tense is due to stylistic choices and not because I accidentally switched tenses (which honestly would have been equally likely!)
> 
> Also, this ended up being over 3k ffs.

“Lady Sobieska,” Piotr said, lowering his eyes deferentially. “Are you certain that you wish to go for a ride in the forest- Surely there are other places you could explore. Places that aren’t quite so…” he trailed off, not wanting to use the word ‘dangerous’ while still within theoretical earshot of any of the Lord’s spies. 

“Yes,” Lady Aniela replied. She was already mounted on her horse, Appelleios, an especially long-suffering chestnut gelding, and Piotr knew that he had no chance of convincing her once she had made her mind up. Still, he tried one more time.

“Only,” he said. “I’m due to be married, see, and I’d like to live long enough for that to happen.” He swung himself into his own horse’s saddle regardless- he was bringing Hebe out today. She was a good horse; a grey mare, sure and steady, and unlikely to shy at loud noises.

“Piotr,” Lady Aniela said. “I swear to you that I’ll see you and Dorata married. On my life.” She clicked her tongue, and Appelleios walked forward, hooves clacking against the stone of the courtyard. Hebe followed obediently, and Piotr sighed as he saw Lady Aniela turn toward the woods.

At least they would be in a more secluded area, and he could relax. Lady Aniela always claimed that she wanted the people around her to speak their minds- and indeed got quiet and sad when they didn’t- but she never thought of the consequences that they might face if her father found them talking to their mistress too familiarly.

“That’s not reassuring,” Piotr said. “If you die, your father will kill me. If you get hurt, your father will kill me. Melitele, if you get a scratch on you, your father might actually kill me.”

“He’s not that bad,” she replied, and Piotr fought the urge to reply, ‘not to you he’s not.’ Because _he_ wasn’t the Lord’s only child, and therefore exempt from his rather nasty temper. Lord Sobieski was an indulgent father, doting on Lady Aniela, but to the rest of them? He was a miserable bastard. “In any case,” she continued. “I have this.”

She twisted around and shifted her saddle blanket until Piotr could see the crossbow that she had hidden there. Oh. Perfect.

“Do you know how to use that?” he asked.

“One of father’s knights gave me a few lessons, though I was concentrating on other things at the time,” she said. “But really, how hard can it be?”

“Hard, my Lady,” Piotr said. “Very hard. In the interest of _not_ getting shot in the arse, is there any chance you’d let me take charge of that?”

“Hmm,” Lady Aniela said, tapping her lip in thought. “No. It’s mine, Piotr! Get your own crossbow, if you’re so worried.”

She smiled at him, her teeth glinting in the spring light, and then with a shout she was off, Appelleios springing forward and disappearing into the trees. Piotr sighed, and followed. One day, he thought, she was going to get him into real trouble. 

#

Apparently that day was today.

“My lady,” Piotr said. “I don’t suppose you can tell me _why_ there’s a man with an arrow in his arse collapsed in front of you?” He paused. “And what I said earlier about shooting people in unfortunate places; that was not meant as encouragement.”

“Oh shut up, Piotr,” Lady Aniela snapped at him. “And help me.” She had already dismounted and was kneeling beside the prone body, hands hovering above. Her voice was steady, but Piotr could see the fine tremors. “In any case,” she continued. “I didn’t mean to! He just- fell out the tree in front of me, and I shot him instinctively.”

“…of course you did,” Piotr sighed, feeling very old, despite being the same age as Lady Aniela. He gave Hebe a pat on her flank and swung himself down. “Who is this man that you’ve shot? And how likely is it that we can just drop him off at the healer’s and be done-” Piotr stilled. He had finally managed to get a good look at the man’s face. At the man’s _very familiar_ face. Well, that explained the whole ‘falling out of a tree’ thing.

“Oh fuck,” he breathed. “My babka is going to kill me.” He knelt by _Jacek Pankratz_ ’s side and reached out to check his pulse. It was steady under his fingers, but who the hell knew what that meant? It wasn’t like he actually knew what it should feel like.

“You know this man?” Hesitation gone, Lady Aniela brushed her fingers through his hair, though her efforts were somewhat stymied by the fact the blond curls were full of knots.

“He’s from Lettenhove, my lady,” Piotr replied. “And I should be bringing him back there, if you can spare me for the rest of the day. I can accompany you back to the main road, and then ride on back to Lettenhove from there-”

“No, wait!” Lady Aniela said. “We could bring him back home- I’m sure that my father would be happy to pay for a healer-”

“No!” Piotr knew that his voice was over-loud, but the people of Lettenhove had protected Jacek Pankratz from the attentions of the nobility for generations, and he’d be damned if he were the reason that they finally took notice of him. “I mean- thank you, my lady, that is very generous of you, but he’s a family friend and he would be much more comfortable at home-”

There was a faint groan, and both of them looked down. Jacek was stirring on the ground, his eyes fluttering open.

“What happened,” he groaned, wincing in pain as his small movement jostled his injuries.

Lady Aniela winced. Bit her lip in consternation. Then took a deep breath. “I’m afraid I shot you, sir,” she said, her voice clear. “I can only offer my sincerest apologies, and the firm promise of Lady Aniela Sobieska that-” but her voice trailed off, because Jacek was staring straight at her. His brown eyes were wide, pupils dilated. He grabbed her shoulder, pulling her down to his own eye level.

“Your eyes,” he said, his speech only slightly slurred.

“What?” Lady Aniela leant closer, placing her own hand atop his. She stared down at him, and Piotr felt the beginnings of a headache. The last thing he needed was a member of the Sobieski family becoming interested in Jacek Pankratz.

“Your eyes are the exact colour of _Aquilegia vulgaris,_ ” he breathed. And then he collapsed once again.

Piotr rolled his eyes. He didn’t know whose turn it was to keep an eye on Jacek, but he was going to have words with them because they hadn’t been doing a good job. At all.

“I can take it from here, my lady,” he said briskly, getting to his feet and hoisting Jacek up. He was disturbingly light, and Piotr made a mental note to let his babka know. He also scooped up the crossbow, dropped and forgotten in a pile of leaves.

Lady Aniela looked torn. “Are you sure I can’t help?” she asked.

“The best thing you can do, my lady, is get back home so I can take my friend back to Lettenhove. Bring him to the healer.” His words were deferential, but he let a hint of steel shine through. He liked his job at the Sobieski estate, but he was already in the shit for letting Jacek be injured; no matter that it wasn’t his responsibility. If he left now, perhaps he could stave off the inevitable. He was in for cold food for a good while, curse it.

“I- you’re right,” Lady Aniela said, and that was a surprise. He’d never heard her back down on anything, not even when she had been convinced that Madeira was a fish, and no one could tell her otherwise. She looked up at him, her blue eyes pleading and said, “But you promise that you’ll let me know if there’s anything that I can do to help?” Her words were terrifyingly sincere; Piotr was certain that if he told her that the key to Jacek’s full recovery was Lord Sobieski’s beloved longsword, that Lady Aniela would have snuck it out and to the healer’s in a heartbeat.

“I promise,” he said.

#

“Well, you look cheerful, Jacek,” Piotr said, wandering into _The Hyacinth_ and shooting his dearest Dorata a grin. She, busy pulling pints of cider, just shook her own head back at him, plaits flying every which way.

“Piotr!” Jacek looked up from his notes, which had multiplied from one single notebook to a sheaf of papers piled high around him and encroaching onto the floor and the neighboring seats. He made a beckoning gesture. “Come! Join me! You can sit, er-” He cast around, looking for a spare seat before giving up and dumped a handful of papers out from the chair next to him onto the floor, “-here!”

Piotr managed to squeeze past the precarious piles of paper, barely avoiding an avalanche, and took the offered seat.

“What are you looking at?” he asked, looking down at the papers. The majority were covered in a surprisingly elegant scrawl, rendered illegible by the size of the writing. It was crammed in every possible corner, twisting and spiraling as there was room. The only place Piotr could see the cream of the parchment was where room had been left for precise schematics.

“What are you working on this time, Jacek?” Piotr asked, twisting his head to try and get a better look at his notes before giving up in disgust.

“Oh, just another protective ward,” Jacek replied, but he was bouncing delightedly in his seat. “I do think it’s my best work yet- if you see here, Piotr, I’ve managed to balance the energy needed so that once the ward has been activated with an initial burst of Chaos, it should self-regulate marvelously well!” He went digging into his pile, searching for a particular parchment that he thrust under Piotr’s nose.

“In fact, by tying the ward to a bloodline, then theoretically the ward could hold for _centuries_ before degrading. Maybe even longer! And then it would just be a matter of maintaining them, rather than having to recast them-”

Piotr laughed, and let words rush over him. Jacek was always like that, eager to share the knowledge or insights that he had gained in his research. Though that was more likely to be observations on a swallow’s flight pattern, or his experiments into identifying the exact components of a certain dye than intricate wards.

“Well,” Piotr said once Jacek paused for breath. “I can’t say I understand it, but I’m happy that your theories are working out. Is this another hypothetical thought exercise?” Absently, he picked up another page, this one mainly filled with schematics, and gave it a brief once-over. He frowned. Strange. The carefully drawn walls looked familiar.

“Ah-” Jacek said, snatching the page back and tucking it at the bottom of his pile. “That one’s not ready to be seen yet.” His voice sounded strange, but then Jacek was incredibly strange and had never hidden it, so Piotr paid it no notice.

“And no,” Jacek continued, fiddling with his pages and staring down at the table. “It’s not hypothetical. That is- this is part of a larger project, one that I’m hoping to complete in the next few weeks.”

“I didn’t know you took commissions.” Or that Jacek had a job, for that matter.

“I don’t,” Jacek was blushing now, and was still unable to meet Piotr’s eyes. “That is- it’s not a commission so much as a gift.”

“A gif?” Piotr didn’t know anyone who would need such intricate wards- at least not in Lettenhove. “Anyone I know?” he asked.

“Just a friend,” Jacek said, and his cheeks really were red now. Piotr grinned to himself; ah, that kind of friend.

“I’m sure that they’ll appreciate it,” he said instead.

“I hope they do,” Jacek said, his voice soft and yearning. “I’m hoping to ask them to go travelling with me, after I’ve finished this.”

“Travelling?” Piotr asked blankly. He’d never known Jacek to leave Lettenhove. And he was fairly certain that neither of his parents, nor grandparents had either.

“Yes,” Jacek said, a small smile on his face. “Travelling.”

Later, when Piotr was hauled in front of Lord Sobieski and interrogated as to the whereabouts of his daughter, he thought back to that conversation and cursed himself for not _sitting_ on Jacek until he’d had a straight answer as to who his friend had been.

#  
  


It was three years before Piotr saw either Lady Aniela or Jacek again. He had been fired from his position as stable hand, but there were worse things in life. And he was kept busy, helping Dorata raise their son, Patryk, while she took over more and more responsibilities from her father.

It was while he was sat behind the bar and doing the sums for the previous month’s expenses- exorbitant, though as Dorata kept reminding him it was only sensible to buy more luxurious food to keep foreign merchants patronising _The Hyacinth_ \- that he saw them. Looked up to see a flash of golden blond.

“Jacek?” he called, brows shooting up in surprise. “Is that you?”

Jacek- and it was him, the hair was unmistakable- bounded over with a wide grin. “Shh!” he said, placing a finger on his lips and peering out from underneath his voluminous cloak. “Don’t say my name too loudly, I’m not meant to be here.”

The cloak wasn’t the only strange sartorial choice; Jacek was wearing a doublet in navy blue silk, embroidered in gold thread, perfectly tailored. His hair was clean and carefully styled and he was wearing knee high boots in dyed black leather that looked both extremely uncomfortable and useless for actually walking anywhere. He looked like a prissy nobleman.

Jacek noticed his stare, and grimaced. “I know,” he said. “The clothes were not my choice. In fact-” he glanced around surreptitiously, and then unlaced the top of his doublet, pulling it open with an audible sigh of relief.

“Jacek!” A familiar voice rang out through the inn, and Jacek gave a guilty start. Lady Aniela strode toward them, shaking her head in disapproval. “You couldn’t keep your doublet laced for five minutes?” she asked. 

“It’s stifling,” Jacek complained. “A true torture device. I can’t breathe when it’s laced up like that.”

“It’s only a few days,” Lady Aniela said. “You think I like wearing stays? And yet here I am, suffering, so it shouldn’t be too hard for my husband to do the same.”

_Husband?_ Piotr didn’t realise he’d asked the question out loud until Jacek beamed at him, grabbing Lady Aniela’s hand- and incidentally curtailing her attempts to lace his doublet back up- and pulling her close.

“Yes!” he says. “We’re married, now. One in the eyes of the gods.” He stared deeply into Lady Aniela’s eyes, his face softening. Lady Aniela gazed back at him, equally adoring, and leant in for a kiss.

Piotr felt extremely awkward. He coughed, staring fixedly to the left of the couple, and probably scaring the elderly gentleman in black who was unfortunate enough to be in his line of sight.

“And Lord Sobieski agreed to that?” he asked eventually, when the two of them showed no signs of stopping.

“Mmm,” Jacek said dreamily.

“Not exactly,” Lady Aniela said. “But that’s why we’re back here-”

“-and wearing these awful clothes-” Jacek muttered.

“-so that we can spend some more time with him,” she continued. “I regret just leaving- he must have been so worried-!”

That was an understatement. Lord Sobieski had torn the region apart, looking for his daughter. Piotr was fairly certain there were still bounties out on her head.

“-but now that we’ve our sweet Julian, it would be a shame for him not to know his grandfather.”

What.

“A child?” Piotr asked. “You’ve got a child?”

“A son,” Jacek bent forward and kissed Lady Aniela again, seemingly unable to help himself. “He’s only a year old, but he’s already started to sing-”

A year surely wasn’t old enough for that.

“He has,” Lady Aniela agreed. “He’s going to be a singer, I swear to Melitele. The lungs that he has!”

“My darling columbine,” Jacek murmured. “He gets them from you.” He leant forward for yet another kiss, and Piotr interjected hastily. Surely, he and Dorata weren’t this bad?

“Then you’ve returned, Jacek?” he said. “For good?”

“Ah,” Jacek said, leaning back and facing Piotr. “That is- I mean- No, I wasn’t planning on it. Not for another few years. This is just a quick visit back, and then we want to go travelling again. Don’t worry though!” he continued hastily as Piotr’s face fell. “The way that I’ve set up the enchantments, Lettenhove will remain safe so long as I’m alive.”

“I’m not worried about that, Jacek,” Piotr snapped. “I’m worried about- look, have you two told Lord Sobieski what your plans are? Because I would be wary, if I were you.”

“My father is all bark and no bite,” Lady Aniela said. “He wasn’t happy, when I told him, but he understands that I’m my own person. And that I’m the one in charge of my own life. If I want to go travelling, he can’t stop me!”

Oh Melitele. He gave a tense smile, and then grabbed Jacek by the sleeve, the fine cloth wrinkling under his touch, pulling him a bit further down the bar.

“Jacek,” he said, lowering his voice. “Please listen to me. Don’t trust Lord Sobieski; he isn’t your friend and he _hates_ you. Do you know what he did when his daughter went missing? Do you know the kind of people that he called for, the monsters that he set on her trail-?”

Jacek laughed, bright and clear. “You worry too much, Piotr,” he said. “I can take care of myself; I promise. In any case, I’m not here to gossip about Anielka’s father. I’m here because I wanted to make sure you and Dorata were still at the _Hyacinth_! I want you to meet my son, and I want my son to meet Lettenhove. I wanted to book the inn for a week tomorrow; Anielka and I can sneak out of the Sobieski estate with Julian and we can have a celebration.”

“Jacek-” Piotr said helplessly, but he could see that his words were having no effect. He sighed. “Yes,” he said instead. “I can arrange that. A week tomorrow, you say?”

“Yes. Better make it the whole day; I have so many people to introduce Julian to! Oh, I can’t wait for you to meet him. He has his mother’s eyes, you know Piotr, the most perfect shade of blue-”

#

Piotr booked the inn and he waited.

When he heard that the Lady Sobieska’s carriage had been set upon by bandits, and that she and her husband had been killed-

He wasn’t surprised.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Aquilegia vulgaris](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquilegia_vulgaris) is a European columbine and traditionally was considered sacred to Venus.  
> Jaskier looks a lot like Aniela; he has her hair and eyes. Jacek is blond with brown eyes, which in a certain light look gold...  
> I grew very attached to Jaskier's parents and I made myself sad. I'm sorry.
> 
> Piotr: yOU'Ve gOT a chILd??  
> Jacek: *shrugs*  
> Jacek: They were on offer?


	17. Yennefer

“After Jacek’s death, Lettenhove was never quite the same. Oh, we were still prosperous. His protection had nothing to do with the amount of trade that came in. But the streets were more dangerous, thieves and brigands roamed the countryside, attacking merchants’ wares… There was a pirate attack off the coast, not two months after the murder- that drove off a lot of the trade. And of course, the storms returned. Terrible storms, battering the cliffs and walls and making it almost impossible for any boats to go out, whether they were large merchant vessels or small family fishing boats- the storm sunk them all.”

Dorata’s voice trails off and she takes her cups and slams back the remaining alcohol, refilling it immediately with trembling hands.

“My Piotr was on one of those fishing boats,” she says, voice steady. “He went out, knowing the danger. Knowing that he could drown.”

“Why?” Yennefer asks. “You and he had this inn- why would he risk his life going on a doomed voyage?”

Dorata’s face hardens and she spits on the floor once again. Thankfully not anywhere near Yennefer.

“Marek Sobieski,” she says. Her face hardens, the lines of anger and grief stark around her eyes. “He ordered more fishing expeditions. Probably panicking at the loss of revenue- well, whose fault was that, you bastard?” Yennefer can see something in her face, something proud and cold and hard and utterly destroyed. Something sends a pang of _something_ through her, and abruptly she stands rather than see this lonely old woman fall apart.

“Thank you for your story,” she says, taking her full silk purse from around her waist- white silk with little purple lilacs embroidered around the edges- and places it gently in front of Dorata. It’ll be a shame to lose the purse itself, but Ciri can make her a new one.

“Véa,” Yennefer says. “We should go. It’s almost nightfall.” And she turns and strides toward the door. She doesn’t know whether she can bare to be in this sad little inn, in this sad little town for one minute longer.

Véa stands but hesitates before following Yennefer. “Dorata,” she says. “Would you be willing to share your story with others? I have a friend who would like to hear it.”

The old woman snorts, toying with her glass of vodka. “I don’t know why they would want to,” she says. “It’s all ancient history now. Dead and gone and buried.”

“Nonetheless, if I were to bring a friend to talk to you, would you still be here?” Véa’s voice is low and intense.

“I could hardly be anywhere else, could I?” Dorata replies. “This place- well, it isn’t worth much anymore, but it was my father’s and it will be my son’s and his son’s after him. I won’t leave it. And- it might not be the place that my Piotrek is buried. But it was his home, too.”

And with that, the tears start coming, rolling down her cheeks and dripping onto the table below. Sobs wrack her frail body, and she folds in on herself.

“Babka!” The boy from behind the bar- Mikolaj- runs over, gently pulling the cup of vodka away from her, and starts running his hands through her hair, murmuring softly to her.

“You should go,” he says, looking up at them both. His voice is low, but Yennefer can feel the anger. “You shouldn’t upset her like this.”

Véa hesitates, and Yennefer sighs. She walks back over to the other woman and pulls her away. “Come,” she says. “There’s nothing we can do for her now. Leave her to her grief.”

#

They are a more sombre pair as the exit the inn. Now that she knows to look for it, Yennefer can feel the remnants of the blessings in the streets of Lettenhove, tattered and fragile as they are.

She had been wrong, Yennefer realises. Earlier when she had felt Jaskier on every street corner. Because it wasn’t him. It was his father. What’s left of him.

“I want to kill him,” Véa growls, as soon as they find a somewhat secluded back alley. “I want to rip out his entrails through his throat, and then force him to eat them. I want to watch the light fade from his eyes as he realises that there’s nothing he can do to stop me; that all his power and games are _nothing_ , that he is _nothing.”_

She’s breathing heavily, one hand clenched tight around her sword hilt, the other balled into a fist.

“Véa,” Yennefer says, stepping closer, and placing her own hand over the fist. She’s a little worried that the Zerrikanian is going to punch the alley wall. She’s never seen her like this. Even when they were fighting back to back in Cintra, Véa had been calm. Professional.

“I understand,” she says. “I understand that you’re angry. I am too-” and she is, she burns inside. For the loss of two people who she never knew, but who she can imagine all too easily. And when had she become so soft that even the fate of these unknown strangers could slip past her shields? Just because she can see the shades of Jaskier in them both, “-but you can’t do this now. Do you understand? We have to concentrate. The whole point of these amulets is so that we can slip in undetected; we can’t jeopardise that by killing Marek Sobieski, no matter how much I want to.”

And she does. She wants to use to amulets to march into Sobieski’s estate, use her Chaos to wreak death and destruction. Burn the whole place to the ground. Destroy this putrid speck on humanity, this _worm_ who encapsulates a society that first suffocated her, and then banished her when she wouldn’t play by its rules. She pushes down the emotion with practised ease.

“Remember,” Yennefer says. “That Sobieski managed to kill a dragon. A dragon who was defending his family. If he has weapons or allies that are capable of that, we need to find them. And make sure that they cannot harm anyone else. One old man, no matter how possessive, should not have been able to kill Jacek Pankratz. No matter how possessive the man, nor how trusting the dragon.”

Véa shudders again, and Yennefer can feel her hand clench and unclench spasmodically. Then she takes a deep breath, in and out, and calms herself, drawing on her control as a warrior.

“Once we find this information,” Véa says. “Swear to me, Yennefer of Vengerberg, that we will destroy Marek Sobieski, until not even the gods remember his name. For Julek. For his parents. For Lettenhove. Swear it to me.”

“I swear it,” Yennefer replies, her voice unwavering. She brings grips both of Véa’s hands, tightly, and stares into her eyes. “Though perhaps we ought to talk to Borch beforehand. And Jaskier. We could make a family outing of it.”

Véa rests her head against Yennefer for one brief moment. Then she nods, and steps back, their fingers untangling. “I am ready,” she says.

Yennefer looks at her. Looks at the fire banked in her eyes. And then she lifts her arms and creates a portal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, nice family outing, anyone? They could have a bonfire, some s'mores, a little light murder...


	18. Jaskier

_Hold the shape in your mind,_ Borch says, voice low and calm. _You’ve inhabited your human shape for forty years. You know it; know its intricacies, its flaws and faults._

_Oh, so something easy then,_ Jaskier grumbles, trying to think of the exact sensation of his hands carding through his hair. Or what his nose looked like, exactly. Yes, people have called him vain ( _fucking_ Valdo Marx), but that doesn’t mean that he spends hours peering at himself in clear lakes and tarnished silver mirrors.

…and even if he maybe has spent quite a few hours (over forty years mind!) peering at himself, that doesn’t mean that his memory is good enough to perfectly replicate it. In fact, the harder that he tries to grasp the memories, the more they slip form his memory. Like water, running through his grasp. Or fine crepe silk, the sort that one can find in that little shop in Toussaint, where the weather is fine and the inhabitants finer. Mmm, yes, the feel of that delicate silk against his hands; soft but surprisingly strong. Perhaps a metaphor that he can use later? The silk of the Lion Cub of Cintra’s hair- because though he’s not willing to become a cosseted court bard, no not even for Ciri, it would be a tragedy of the highest order if he doesn’t compose at least one ballad for her.

_Julian,_ comes Borch’s warning voice.

Yes. Right. Concentrate. He doesn’t fancy accidentally turning himself into a bolt of silk. Would that even work though? Surely silk isn’t sentient, and therefore isn’t something that one can transform themselves into? Unless, of course, there are scores of young dragons, unable to still their own thoughts, who have accidentally transformed themselves into any number of household objects and are- even now- stuck like that, their memories slowing sinking and fading until nothing is left…

No, yes. Concentrate. Fingers, opposable thumb, the way that the muscles and tendons move beneath his skin… His friend, Shani, at Oxenfurt had tried to show him the inner workings of the human body, once. In fact, he recognised many of the anatomy books that Yennefer had brought as ones that had been scattered around Shani’s rooms at Oxenfurt. No! Concentrate. Fingers. Don’t think of Shani; she’s a very attractive of course- Jaskier has found few people for whom he hasn’t been able to find an attractive quality or two- but her voice is simply atrocious from what he remembers from their drunken mishaps in the various pubs, and he needs a good voice. What’s more, Shani is a rather successful doctor of medicine, and should he, Jaskier, assume her form accidentally he might run the risk of being put in a position of responsibility-

Concentrate! Jaskier wrenches his thoughts back into their correct progression. Why is this so hard?

Hands. Fingers. So that he can play his lute. Who’s been propped sadly against the cave wall for months- actually, he should probably ask Ciri to take a look at her. Give her some love. Maybe Yennefer could pick him up some oil; he’ll have to ask her when he next sees her-

If she ever comes back, that is.

Oh, for fuck’s sake. Jaskier opens his eyes and- he doesn’t pout. He really doesn’t- while he doesn’t mind bringing smiles and laughter to the lips of his companions, he would rather it be through his clever lyrics and thinly-veiled innuendos than their mistaken belief that he is in any way _cute._

_I don’t think this is working,_ Jaskier says. _I keep trying, I really do, but every time I get anywhere there’s something else to think of! Changing into a dragon- while horrifying in its own right, and actually incredibly painful both emotionally and physically- With those small caveats, changing into a dragon was much easier! I don’t suppose there’s time to go and find some elves and get to re-enchanting my stone so that I can get somewhere with this whole ‘becoming a human again’ thing?_

Borch huffs, shaking his head. _Julian,_ he says, _There is a reason that I said that it would take decades to master. And that is taking into account your own previous experience with a human form. The first time is difficult. And even if we could find an elven mage- assuming that they haven’t gone deep into hiding or been killed by now- your stone would be nothing but a crutch. If you ever lost it, then we would just have to go through all of this again._

Jaskier huffs, collapsing onto the stone floor. They are back in the cave, though he has tentatively promised Ciri that tomorrow they can spend more time at the hot springs so that she can show them to Yennefer and Véa (though Jaskier suspects that Véa already knows about them- very little is kept secret between Borch and his weapons), and in lieu of his anatomy lessons with Yennefer, his father had proposed that they work together on the transformation.

Which Jaskier had jumped on, because _yes_ who better to learn from than he expert? But it’s proving more difficult than he thought. And he has a sinking suspicion that the entire reason that Borch offered in the first place was to take his mind off Yennefer and Véa. Who still haven’t returned, despite it being _hours_ after sunset by now. Who are both in in Lettenhove, and who might- even as he sits here and wastes time thinking about silk of all things- be bleeding out in his grandfather’s dungeons.

_They’ll be safe, won’t they?_ Jaskier asks before he can stop himself, the words escaping in a burst of emotion. _I mean- Yennefer is a powerful sorceress, and Véa can kill a man with her bare hands. My grandfather would be no match against them._ Anxiously, he begins to pace, his tail thrashing and his wings held stiff behind him.

_It’s a surprise that the old bastard is still alive,_ he continues, wincing at the expletive and hurrying on before Borch can comment on it. _He must be what, nearing ninety by now? And yes, he is a pampered member of the nobility, but surely not even he can win the battle against time for much longer. No, really, it’s only a matter of waiting. Maybe we should call them- use the Xenovox that Geralt has not so stealthily hidden-_ he projects those few words and can feel the amusement back from Geralt, - _and call them. Tell them that there’s no need to risk their lives like this. Not that I think they’re risking their lives! Just their sanity, really. By grandfather is a terrible conversationalist; all ‘you’re bringing shame to the family name’ and ‘sit straight’. Really, terribly boring._

Borch growls, and Jaskier stops his pacing to look at him in surprise. _…was it something I said?_ he asks meekly.

_Yes,_ Borch says, moving forward and scooping him up by his neck so that he can place him firmly between his forearms, _But nothing that you have done. Nothing at all, my son. While I would appreciate you developing some sense of self-preservation-_

_Hey!_ Jaskier says, but it’s a half-hearted denial at best.

_-there is absolutely nothing that you could do that would bring shame upon this family. And I would like to have words with anyone who would say otherwise._

From the way that Jaskier can feel the simmering rage that underpins his father’s mind, he doesn’t think that ‘words’ are the only things that he wants to exchange with his grandfather.

He gives a low whine without meaning to, twisting around to look Borch in the eyes.

_But- you wouldn’t, would you? It’s just- nothing good comes from Lettenhove. Nothing. There’s no redeeming features to it, none. It’s a place of pain and misery, and I don’t want you to go there. You can’t._

_Julian-_

_No! You can’t. I refuse to lose another father there, I refuse!_ His breathes are coming in great heaving pants, his claws digging into the stone below him until they creak and ache, but his gaze is steady.

_You’re the last golden dragon- the last adult, anyway,_ he continues. _Who’s going to look after Saskia? I mean, I’m good, but I’m under no illusions that I can control her in any way, shape, or form! Who’s going to make sure that I don’t end my days as a teacup if you’re not here? Geralt is actually very clumsy, I’ll have you know; I’d be broken in a fortnight!_

_Julian!_

Jaskier flinches, the memories associated with that name and that tone close to the surface. Borch sees it, and something terrible passes over his face before it returns to its habitual serenity.

_Julek,_ he says. _I cannot promise that I will never visit Lettenhove; if nothing else, once this is over and only once you’re ready, it might be good for you to return. And if you choose to do so, I would accompany you. But I can say that I have no intention of dying for centuries yet. I have been keeping myself alive for a very long time; I don’t intend to fail now._ Borch’s voice gentles, infused with a terrible determination that weaves its way through Jaskier’s panicked thoughts. _I won’t leave you. Or your sister._

_You promise?_ Jaskier asks, hating the fact he sounds like nothing more than a scared child, but compelled to ask, nonetheless.

_I promise._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me: no, I won't write a chapter today, I should go to bed, I have a lecture-  
> Also me: *starts typing*


	19. Yennefer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry that I've been absent for so long! I got very caught up in hand-sewing an Elizabethan chemise and dress, and then I had my exams 😅 But they're all finished now! So hopefully I should be able to get back into the swing of writing soon! (though I might possibly have to wait until after I finish packing to- fingers crossed- go home!)
> 
> In any case, thank you so much for all of your beautiful comments and to everyone who's been reading and leaving kudos! I appreciate them so much, and it always brightens my day to see them!

The door swings open under her touch, the hinges creaking. They are spotted with rust; they have not been taken care of. Nothing seems to have been taken care of; a thin air of neglect hangs over the entire house like a shroud. The Sobieski estate was once a grand house, and hints of its past glory can be glimpsed; the well-patched tapestries glinting with thread-of-gold, the soft gleam of the wooden floors beneath their feat.

If Yennefer were a certain bard, she might say that things are going _too_ well, thereby condemning them all to some ridiculous third act twist ambushing them and causing them all to be captured or killed. She isn’t, however, so she says nothing.

Things are going suspiciously well, though. The amulets got them through the wards easily enough, the gold strands stretching and welcoming them, the faint feel of _Jaskier_ \- or rather of his father, Jacek- heavy in the air.

Yennefer has already seen how impressive the wards were from the outside- the fine tracery of magic infused into every brick, gilding the walls until they _gleam_ \- but the magic is equally impressive inside the estate, if more subtle. A feel, a hint, a murmur in the air. The almost imperceptible smell of sulphur brushes at her nose, cutting through the stench of mould and must that linger in the corridors. And-

“Can you feel that?” Yennefer asks, voice low and close to Véa’s ear. Needlessly, possibly. They’re only seen a few people, all of them easily avoided; tired-looking servants wearing plain and well-patched clothes. The occasional elderly guard. Still, better safe than sorry.

“Yes,” Véa says. There’s something in the tightness of her voice; is it grief? Awe? Something in between? Yennefer- well, she’s of the opinion that if Jacek Pankratz hadn’t noticed that his father-in-law was a murderous and overprotective bastard, more so than usual for a member of the nobility, then he deserved what came to him. She has no time for the ignorance and innocence, not when it leads to wreck and ruin and death not only for the erstwhile innocent but also for his family and the entire town that had been taken under his protection. It’s the kind of ignorance that only those who have power can afford.

Jaskier, despite his wide-eyed and annoyingly optimistic outlook on the world- especially when it’s far too early in the morning and his thoughts won’t _shut up_ \- would never make that mistake.

Still, Yennefer can’t deny that she feels an echo of Véa’s grief as the only reminder that Jacek Pankratz ever existed- his magic- curls into her head, bright and warm and curious- the faintest imprint of his personality. It’s not unsurprising that Véa- whose culture venerates dragons and who’s been Borch’s right hand and protector for longer than a normal human’s lifespan- is angry. 

She’d have been able to tell that Véa was upset even if the she hadn’t had to convince the Zerrikanian not to burn the whole estate to the ground a few hours ago- her left hand is held stiff against her side where Yennefer knows she keeps one of her spare daggers and though she’s stalking through the halls with her usual grace, there is something emphatically more murderous than usual in her gait.

Véa touches her hand. “Are there any traps?” she asks, her voice a tickle against Yennefer’s cheek.

Yennefer ignores the instinctive flush that comes to her cheek- she can think about that later when they can have a proper conversation and don’t run the risk of being caught- and instead takes a deep, steadying breath. And opens her mind.

And then she immediately pulls herself back with a wince and dull thud of what’s shaping up to be a truly spectacular migraine.

“What is it?” Véa asks, reaching over to squeeze Yennefer’s wrist. She shudders and places her own hand over Véa’s, squeezing it tighter, grounding herself.

“There’s too much magic,” Yennefer grinds out. “The wards- they’re obscuring everything else.”

Bright is an understatement. It’s like looking into the sun. Painful, yes, but also so all-encompassing that she’s having difficulty seeing anything else.

Véa hums at her in agreement. “Then we shall just have to take the risk,” she says, stepping forward-

“Wait!” Yennefer says, tightening her grasp. “Don’t. I don’t trust that bastard Sobieski not to have set up something truly malicious and damn the servants who might get caught in the crossfire. In any case, I have an idea. I just need a moment.”

So saying, she takes hold of her amulet in one hand and Véa’s in the other- Véa leaning forward to give her better access- and shuts her eyes in concentration. She reaches out to the wards around her, filtering her presence through Jaskier’s blood, his essence, his gift, freely given. And then, feeling slightly foolish, she opens her mind, lowering her shields and leaving herself almost defenceless. Her mind falls into the familiar tracks of draconic telepathic communication. She doesn’t know whether the magic can understand words- doubtful that it’s retained enough sentience for that. Emotions though-

She pulls up the anger burning in her, the fierce protectiveness that has _somehow_ grown within her, the rage at the spectacle of yet another old, noble bastard who thinks that he can take and take whatever he wants and damn the consequences-

She feels the hint of curiosity that is Jacek’s legacy turn its attention to her. And then it’s blazing through her, leaving burning trails of pain in its wake.

She opens her eyes.

“Yennefer-” Véa says.

“Not now,” Yennefer says, panting. She can’t hold this for long. Just long enough to- _yes._ She stares into the Sobieski’s study with unseeing eyes. The floorboards and the desk are covered in a dark miasma, one that makes her feel nauseous to even look at it. It feels- familiar, but she can’t tell whether that’s because Jacek’s magic knows it or because she herself knows the sorcerer who cast it.

“The floorboards and the desk,” Yennefer says, her voice distant. “There’s a curse on them. Designed to turn someone inside out- literally.” Nasty, gory, utter overkill. Sadistic in its execution, taking the energy from every death it caused to become more and more powerful. It had already claimed dozens of victims; she could feel the curse shedding so much energy that if the wards weren’t there to mask it then Yennefer would have felt it from a mile away.

“Can you destroy it?” Véa asks.

“No,” Yennefer says. “Or I can, but the results would be- explosive. And we’re trying to keep a low profile. But I can protect you.”

She turns to touch Véa’s forehead, layering protective wards over her skin into she gleams.

“There’s something underneath the floorboards,” Yennefer says. “A hidden compartment. Three steps forward and two to the right. Whatever it is, it’s well-protected. And there’s something -”, Jacek, the magic, all of them blurring together in her head, “-telling me that we should look there.”

Véa doesn’t question her just moves forward where directed, and Yennefer allows herself a moment of relief that at least someone listens to her. She has no doubt that if Jaskier were here she would have to endure a good five minutes of non-stop questions about what, exactly, she was doing and how to best turn it into a ballad. The magic in her head pulses at the thought of Jaskier, eagerly searching and digging in, and she lets it.

“Véa,” she calls out, a fresh ache unfurling in her head. “There’s something else in the desk drawer- the lowest one on the right. Something important-”

_Yes,_ the magic agrees with her, humming in content. _Important._ It sends another bolt of pain through her.

Yennefer closes her eyes and breathes through it. She’s Yennefer of Vengerberg, and she is not going to let something as tawdry as _pain_ defeat her.

Seconds, minutes, hours later, there’s a light touch on her hand. She opens her eyes and stares straight into Véa’s concerned eyes.

“You can let it go now, Yennefer,” she says. “You’ve done well and now I’m finished.”

Yennefer shudders and does so. With some difficulty- the magic is not eager to relinquish its hold. If she didn’t know better, she would say it feels _lonely._

“Do you have enough power to make the portal back?” Véa asks, catching her as she slumps in pain and exhaustion.

“I’m going to have to,” Yennefer says. “Because I’m not spending one minute more here.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter went in a *slightly* different direction than I anticipated 😅 and it was surprisingly hard getting back into the swing of writing this! I hope that you enjoyed the chapter!


	20. Jaskier

Jaskier wakes to a growling stomach and an intense itching. He grumbles to himself, stretching and rubbing his back against the ground to try and find some relief. It doesn’t work. In fact, it only makes it worse, going a faint annoyance to an unbearable- and impossible to ignore- ache.

His grumbling becomes louder and he huffs to himself. There’s no getting out of it; he’s going to have to leave his delicious cocoon of warmth and get out of bed. There’s no way he’s going to be able to get back to sleep when what feels like a colony of ants have make their home under his skin. Maybe a nice bath will soothe the itching? And while he’s up he might try and see if there’s anything around to eat… He’s certain that there are some leftovers from dinner.

First though, he has to start the laborious process of getting out of the pile of intertwined limbs without waking anybody up, and especially not Saskia. They’re all tired and worried and he doesn’t want to interrupt anyone’s rest just because he’s accidentally rolled in a patch of nettles, or whatever’s caused this _infernal itching._

He uncurls his tale from around Ciri’s wrist and raises his wings high above him to clear them from the knot of bodies, barely daring to breath as Saskia snuffles at the abrupt lack of warmth. She settles after a moment, and Jaskier continues onward, carefully stepping out from Geralt’s hold and tiptoe-ing toward the edge of Borch’s wings, ducking out from underneath them and emerging into the cold night air.

Yennefer and Véa still aren’t back. He tries not to let that worry him.

He isn’t the only one worried; he can see Téa pacing restlessly in the outer cave, shooting the golden wards an aggrieved look. She nods at him when she catches him watching but doesn’t stop her pacing. Back and forth and back and forth until he’s fair dizzy from watching her. He considers going over- perhaps they can be worried together- but another itch spasms through him and he shudders and quickly abandons that plan. Later. He can talk to her later. And who knows; by the time he’s managed to get his bath heated and had a nice, long soak, perhaps Yennefer and Véa will have returned and all the worry will be rendered moot.

He creeps further away from his sleeping hoard and- once he’s sure that the wind of his wings won’t disturb them- launches himself into the air, flapping furiously to gain altitude. He’s huffing and puffing after only a few minutes; perhaps he has become spoilt, having Geralt as his personal launch pad. But at least the ache in his wings and his back are a good distraction from the _itching._

Seriously. Is he allergic to something? Ciri (and Geralt, and to be fair mostly Geralt) were in charge of dinner the night before- if it possible that one of them had picked up something poisonous and added it to the stew? A mushroom perhaps, or a bright berry. Geralt would know better than that though, surely, and even if Ciri had managed to sneak it past him, Jaskier would hope that his famed Witcher senses would have noticed that something was off in taste or smell and stopped them from eating it! If not poison, then perhaps something that Jaskier is allergic to?

He wracks his brains, but he can’t think of anything that he, specifically, is unable to eat- indeed, it’s always been one of his greatest talents and one of the thinks that has allowed him to stay alive for so long in his travels- the fact that he can generally down anything without feeling the ill effects. True, he would rather have something _nice_ to eat, but there’s no accounting for people’s tastes in music (generally poor!) and there have been many days where his dinner has been nothing better than a hunk of stale bread (previously used as a projectile or not) or some sort of slop that he’s begged from a sympathetic tavern owner. Though evidently not one sympathetic enough to give him actual food instead of the slop and leftovers from the previous night’s meal.

It’d actually been one of his first bonding experiences with Geralt- cold and footsore (or at least he was, because Roach was apparently not meant for wandering bards, her backside reserved only for surly Witchers) and grimly splitting a single loaf of bread. Geralt had insisted that he be the one to eat the half with the visible mould on it. And by insisted, Jaskier means that the Witcher had torn the bread in half and stuffed the green part into his own mouth.

His flight is a short one; Jaskier dives toward the pools in the back of the cave, determined to soak himself- only to remember at the last minute that he’s trying to be quiet and banking, landing next to the pool instead of into the middle of it. Ok, yes any large splash would (probably?) have been masked by the extremely noisy waterfall, but he’s trying to be considerate! It’s the principle of the matter! And possibly diving headfirst into a pool isn’t the best idea when he’s tired distracted- no doubt Téa would rescue him before he actually drowned, but he has no faith that she won’t rat him out to his father. Almost drowning once is an accident, doing so twice is a habit and one that he’s eager not to have people tease him about.

He eases himself in, shuddering at the cold. If there’s one upside to the whole dragon thing (apart from, evidently, his family) it’s the fact that he never has to put up with cold baths ever again. Unless he wants to, that is, but he can’t imagine he’ll ever reach that level of masochism (or machoism). The cold does numb his skin though. That’s nice.

He sits in the pool for as long as he can bear it- which feels like hours but is probably closer to five minutes- and then he _breathes_ , shooting out small tendrils of fire and raising the temperature of the pool until it’s reached an almost unbearable heat, small bubbles dotting the surface- and then he relaxes. Curls up on a stone shelf with only his nose poking out and luxuriates in the heat. He has the best ideas, the very best ideas, because the itching disappears. He wriggles happily, sending small ripples across the surface of the water. Sweet relief!

He closes his eyes and stays there until the water cools to room temperature (which considering that the ‘room’ he’s in is in actual fact an open-air cave is pretty cold), then he reluctantly opens his eyes. He uncurls and indulges himself in a long stretch. He feels a lot more relaxed now. Almost floppy, like all of his bones have turned to mush. He climbs out, noting with pleasure that the itching hasn’t come back, then shakes out his wings to dry them. He’s ready to go and raid the leftovers, potential allergenics be damned. Then he freezes. Because there is something- several somethings- floating on top of the pool. He reaches forward tentatively and nudges one of them with a claw. It’s wet and slimy and immediately wraps itself around his claw.

Jaskier freezes. Because the object is thin and papery and covered in scales and- and he has a horrible feeling that he knows where it came from.

He looks down at himself. And there are strips of skin all around him, white and papery and oh no, oh Melitele, has he accidentally _boiled_ his _skin_ off??

Oh no, this was a terrible idea.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jaskier: oh gods, oh no, what have I doneeeeee. Baths! How you have betrayed me!!  
> Everyone else:...  
> Jaskier: Woe, oh woe is me-  
> Any reptile owner, or anyone who knows anything about reptiles: *facepalm*
> 
> I actually haven't ever owned a reptile, so I hope that this description is moderately accurate? I'm going for Jaskier being more like a lizard, where his skin comes off in patches as opposed to snakes etc where it comes off in one intact piece.


	21. Yennefer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again guys, thank you so very much for all of your love and your beautiful, beautiful comments that I read and reread to myself! I appreciate it a lot, just you don't even know. Also, thank you to everyone who left interesting reptile facts because I loved them so much!
> 
> Just a quick note that it's possible that you might not received a notification for chapter 19, aka Yennefer's last chapter, as the AO3 emails were a bit wonky at the time of posting so you might want to go and take a look at that if you can't remember reading about Yennefer and Véa exploring the Sobieski estate!

The cave is in absolute _chaos_. Yennefer isn’t certain as to whether the sheer amount of shouting- both physical and telepathic- is a by-product of her exhausted brain, or maybe something to do with the deceptively plain wooden box that she’s holding in her hands. The one that fairly _thrumming_ with Chaos and that, were she less exhausted, she would have opened back at the Sobieski Estate.

As it is, it’s only Véa’s firm grip and gentle support that keeps her upright once the Chaos has rushed through her and out to form the portal. Yennefer isn’t used to thinking of her magic as anything other than an inexhaustible well- filled to the brim with the pain and anger and passion that has characterised her life- but after hosting Jacek’s magic, she can’t help but feel that she’s scraping the bottom of her reserves.

And it’s only the fact that Véa too stops abruptly in response to the unexpected mayhem that greets them that convinces her that she isn’t seeing some sort of waking nightmare.

“What the fuck are they all doing awake at-” Yennefer pauses. She has no idea what time it is, only that it is far too early to deal with this bullshit. And that she had been counting on at least a few hours’ sleep before having to figure out who to tell and what. As it is, she’s half-afraid that she’ll do a Jaskier and just blurt it all out.

“I don’t know,” Véa says, looking as tired as she is. “They do, however, look occupied. Perhaps we could sneak around them while they’re distracted?”

Occupied is an understatement. Jaskier is whining pitifully- but dramatically enough that Yennefer isn’t truly worried about whether he’s injured or not- his shrill chirps echoing through the air and making it impossible for anyone to ignore them. He is literally fluttering from person to person- one minute perched on Geralt’s head, the next pacing distractedly around Ciri, the next twirling around Borch’s legs. Even the horses aren’t spared his circling, though Roach is taking it with more patience than Yennefer had thought she possesses. Though, and once again this might be the fatigue talking, for a moment she does imagine she can see Roach rolling her eyes. 

Geralt is also taking it in stride; absently petting Jaskier’s head every time he’s landed on with a look in his eyes that suggest both that he’s been woken far too early and that he’s working hard to untangle whatever panicked messages Jaskier is shouting into his mind. His nonchalance is another sign that nothing is truly wrong; his swords are propped up against the far wall- next to Jaskier’s lute- where they now live, and he’s leaning against Borch’s flank. Something that he has been incredibly loath to do, no matter how much Jaskier has begged and pleaded. There’s a large bowl of stew next to him, and every so often the Witcher will push it nearer to Jaskier who will take a furious bite before resuming his panicked flight.

Borch is swivelling his head so that his eyes follow Jaskier’s snaking path; no doubt he’s speaking platitudes and explanations into his son’s head. Yennefer is just surprised that he hasn’t gone cross-eyed from the effort, though considering that he’s been a parent to some of the most hyperactive dragons in existence for months, perhaps it is a skill that he has picked up in self-defence.

Ciri and Saskia at least aren’t causing any trouble, though they are both awake. They are going to be utterly unproductive the following day- later today?- but considering Yennefer’s current state of being she’s going to be equally unproductive, so she doesn’t take the time to worry about that. Once the two of them share their news and discoveries, it’s unlikely that anyone is going to be able to concentrate on anything else, so that is a day lost to teaching in any case. What’s more, a Saskia being entertained by Ciri is a Saskia who isn’t trying to attack Geralt, which is a net positive in many cases. Not all cases, because Yennefer is a firm proponent of the belief that Geralt just needs to get over himself a lot of the time- and biting is a sure-fire way to achieve that- but most cases.

Ciri is drying something in front of the fire. Dangerously close to the fire, but it’s not caught alight yet and Yennefer is too tired to do anything about it. Borch is no doubt keeping an eye on it. He’s had practice keeping control of budding pyromaniacs; she’ll defer the child-watching to him. In any case, Saskia appears to be trying to eat whatever Ciri is drying, gulping it down whenever she turns away; it is in more danger of being eaten than being immolated, so Yennefer resolves not to worry about it.

“I don’t think that they’d notice a herd of griffins at this point,” Yennefer murmurs back to Véa. “We can make it.” She hesitates. “In the interest of not causing more chaos, we should probably bring the boxes with us. I’ll ward them against prying eyes and potential curses and then we can forget about them- for a night, at least.”

“A good plan,” Véa says, slipping her free arm around Yennefer’s waist. The sorceress leans more securely against her, accidentally catching Borch’s eye as she gives the disorder behind her one last glance. The dragon nods at her as if in permission, and she feels a bolt of irritation run through her at the thought that she _needs_ or wants his permission. It’s muted by tiredness though, and the two of them turn away.

“Where are we going?” Yennefer asks. They are heading neither toward the pile of bedding near the fire nor to the pillow fort.

“The lower caverns,” Véa replies. “Sound doesn’t travel so easily down there.” Her face doesn’t change, but Yennefer knows that she’s referring to Jaskier’s incessant screeching- that still hasn’t subsided- and she almost laughs, muffling herself at the last moment.

“I’ve never been there before,” she says instead. To her knowledge, the only things in the lower caverns are the large, freezing chambers packed with enough food supplies to last out a famine. She’s never been down there, and she’s never wanted to. Her childhood had provided enough experience of butchery and hunting for a lifetime. Now she considers that there might be more secrets down there, more reasons to be curious.

“No,” Véa replies. “You would not have. Only Téa and I spend time in their depths. They are best kept a mystery to outsiders.”

Neither of them say anything as Véa guides them through the dark and twisting corridors until they come to a small chamber. There’s a fire burning in one corner- its twisting flames and the distinct lack of suffocating smoke indicating that there must also be a chimney somewhere- and there are tapestries hanging on the wall in stark, geometric shapes. There are several chests on the floor and two bedrolls. The thick walls and roof have muffled all noise so that Yennefer can hear nothing but the sound of their breathing and the crackle of the fire.

“Téa and I sleep down here, sometimes,” Véa says, carefully collecting the boxes retrieved from the Sobieski estate and placing them in a small chest on the opposite side of the bedrolls, letting Yennefer sink down into the comfortable pile of blankets with an exhausted sigh, unlacing her dress and discarding it in a crumpled heap next to the nearest bedroll. With tired flick of her fingers, Yennefer throws up the strongest wards that she can think of around the chest, giving them a moment to settle before checking to see if they’re held. She can’t sense the Chaos emanating from the boxes anymore. Good enough.

“It is an honour to be considered family by dragons- a great honour- but it can be-” Véa, tugging off her own leather jerkin, pauses to search for the proper word with all the grace and delicacy of a seasoned politician, “-overwhelming.”

Yennefer snorts, thinking of Jaskier and his new, and incessant need, to keep them all in sight at all times.

“Overwhelming,” she says. “Is certainly one way of putting it.”

“Yes,” Véa says, her mouth curling up into a smile and settling on the blankets next to Yennefer. “There is no word for it in Common, but in Zerrikanian we would say that he is full of _Sehnsucht;_ yearning for happiness. Or that he was, and now that he has found it, he does not want to let it go.” She shrugs, the motion only slightly marred by exhaustion. “He is young,” she continues, “he will grow out of it. Or perhaps he will not. He is a dragon, after all, and who can tell the will of dragons?”

“He’d better grow out of it,” Yennefer grumbles, collapsing back into the blankets with a sigh of relief. “I don’t intend to be chained to this place for the next few centuries because Jaskier has separation anxiety.”

“Would it be so bad?” Véa asks, settling herself down in the blankets. “Having somewhere to return to in the centuries to come?”

_No_ , Yennefer wants to say. Perhaps it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world.

She doesn’t say it though. Instead she closes her eyes and falls asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yennefer: *sees the absolute chaotic mess of a cave*  
> Yennefer: nopes out because she is too tired to deal with this shit
> 
> Apparently Yennefer is also noping out when it comes to emotional conversations, but then she is _very_ tired.
> 
> Sehnsucht is German, because apparently I made Zerrikanian German? I blame the fact I am trying to catch up with Critical Role and that Zerrikanian and Zemnian sound really similar... Also, I actually speak some German, so I know that I'm not going to make a horrible (yet somehow hilarious at the same time???) mess of it all (despite the fact this is likely to be the only German word in this fic haha 😅)

**Author's Note:**

> I have put a relatively large amount of geography in this, so [here](https://atlasoficeandfireblog.files.wordpress.com/2019/04/the-witcher-map-1.png) is the map of the Continent that I am using! 
> 
> Thank you to everyone who's come back, and I hope that you enjoy this sequel! As always, I am on Tumblr as [Nemainofthewater ](https://nemainofthewater.tumblr.com)


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